Blowing away any question about who rules the cloud, Microsoft posted cloud revenue for the quarter ended June 30 of $19.5 billion, which is quite the combined total of cloud revenue from Amazon and Google for an equivalent period.
On my weekly Cloud Wars Top 10 rankings, Microsoft is that the longtime #1, Amazon is that the longtime #2, and Google Cloud earlier this year climbed to #3.
While Microsoft’s streak of getting more cloud revenue than the combined total of its two top rivals will probably be broken calendar Q3, the accomplishment is extraordinary and deserves to be highlighted, particularly because numerous people still have the misguided impression that Amazon instead of Microsoft is king of the cloud.
Now, before showing the numbers and doing the maths, the most important story is that each one 3 companies delivered outstanding leads to the quarter ended June 30, which for Microsoft is its fiscal Q4. Without question, demand for cloud services, solutions and capabilities are surging because the world’s 3 largest and most-influential cloud providers experienced huge demand across their entire portfolios as customers strive to become end-to-end digital businesses.
Here’s how the cloud-revenue numbers compute for calendar Q2:
- Microsoft $19.5 billion, up 36%
- AWS $14.81 billion, up 37%
- Google Cloud $4.63 billion, up 54%
- AWS + Google Cloud = $19.44 billion
So, blockbuster performances across the board, reflecting the broad and deep march to the cloud for businesses of each size and in every industry and in every region of the planet. a couple of thoughts on those stunning figures:
- Last quarter was the primary time during a while that AWS’s rate of growth topped that for Microsoft cloud
- Annualized cloud-revenue run rates: Microsoft $78 billion, AWS $59 billion, Google Cloud $18.5 billion
- Cloud revenue as percentage of total corporate revenue: Microsoft 42.2%; Amazon 12%; Google 7.5%
- On a sequential basis, all 3 companies saw cloud-revenue growth increase from Q1 to Q2: Google Cloud from 46% to 54%; AWS from 32% to 37%; and Microsoft Cloud from 33% to 36%.
Every quarter, we see various reports yapping about how Amazon dominates over Microsoft and Google within the cloud. And if the subject is restricted exclusively to cloud infrastructure, that’s true—AWS is that the IaaS category creator and king and there’s little question that.
But once you take the view that business customers take—how can the varied parts of the cloud help me move faster, grow faster, and dazzle my customers?—then all aspects of the cloud are included, and Microsoft emerges because the unmistakable leader.
Think about it: two of the wealthiest and most technologically advanced companies on Earth—Amazon and Google—had cloud businesses that half-moon grew 37% and 54%. And still the combined cloud revenue for both of these great companies didn't match that of Microsoft.
And that encapsulates why Microsoft unquestionably rules the cloud, why it's done so for the past 2-1/2 years and why it's been #1 on the Cloud Wars Top 10 for all of that point.
