AWS sales head slams Microsoft cloud practices

Microsoft building
(Image credit: ClearCutLtd/Pixabay)

Amazon Web Services (AWS) bigwig Matt Garman has fired shots at Microsoft regarding recent changes to its cloud licensing practices.

In a LinkedIn post, Garman, a senior vice president for sales and marketing at AWS, said: "Customers and policy makers around the world increasingly see Microsoft's recent licensing rhetoric as a troubling admission of the same anti-competitive tactics that many companies have been raising with them for years, but went unheeded until they were put before the European Commission".

The aggressive rhetoric comes after Microsoft bowed to legal pressure from a collection of European cloud firms, including OVHcloud and Nextcloud, which alleged that Microsoft licenses its products in such as way to make it more expensive to use services other than Azure.

Is this fair?

Some Microsoft licenses are cheaper if firms commit to hosting them in Azure, and they can also receive increased support if they bundle their licenses with Azure.

AWS may have an obvious interest in criticizing Microsft, however, they are not the only ones who are critiquing the extremely concentrated state of the current cloud market. 

A recent article quoted by Garman in his post also clearly derided Microsoft's practices.

Published in the political website The Hill by the University of California, Berkeley, professor Steve Weber said: "The unfortunate fact is that bundling of applications with platforms can be an attractive way for big technology players to protect themselves from competition and raise the costs of switching to the point where it becomes prohibitive for customers to really even consider it."

"It’s attractive for the would-be monopolist, but it’s bad for customers and it’s bad for innovation," Weber added.

It is easy to see why their big cloud is busy arguing - it's a huge market.

Research surveying US IT decision markers by Flexera found that 18% of US enterprises spend $12 million on AWS every year, 15% spend $12 million or more annually on Azure, while 7% spend $12 million or more annually on Google Cloud Platform.

Microsoft hasn't taken the allegations lying down, with Justin Stenger, a senior commercial executive for independent software vendors and gaming at the company firing back in a comment on Garman's LinkedIn post. 

“How many cloud providers does AWS allow to run AWS software?" he said. “What Amazon IP does Amazon allow customers to run in the Microsoft Cloud?”

Via The Register

Will McCurdy has been writing about technology for over five years. He has a wide range of specialities including cybersecurity, fintech, cryptocurrencies, blockchain, cloud computing, payments, artificial intelligence, retail technology, and venture capital investment. He has previously written for AltFi, FStech, Retail Systems, and National Technology News and is an experienced podcast and webinar host, as well as an avid long-form feature writer.

Read more
Microsoft
Microsoft hits back against UK competition lawsuits, slams AWS and Google once again
Digital clouds against a blue background.
UK government says Microsoft and AWS unfairly dominate the cloud market
EU
Microsoft joins European cloud collective following settlement
woman listening to computer
AWS vs Azure: choosing the right platform to maximize your company's investment
EU
AWS quits CISPE board as cloud group continues European push
Image of someone clicking a cloud icon.
Many businesses are overspending on their cloud storage budget
Latest in Pro
Finger Presses Orange Button Domain Name Registration on Black Keyboard Background. Closeup View
I visited the world’s first registered .com domain – and you won’t believe what it’s offering today
Racks of servers inside a data center.
Modernizing data centers: an efficient path forward
Dr. Peter Zhou, President of Huawei Data Storage Product Line
Why AI commonization is so important for business intelligent transformation and what Huawei’s data storage has to offer
Wix automation
The world's leading website builder aims to save businesses time with new tool
Data Breach
Thousands of healthcare records exposed online, including private patient information
China
Juniper patches security flaws which could have let hackers take over your router
Latest in News
Super Mario Odyssey
ChatGPT is the ultimate gaming tool - here's 4 ways you can use AI to help with your next playthrough
Brad Pitt looks over his right shoulder with 'F1' written behind him
Apple Original Films will take you behind-the-scenes of a racing cockpit in this new thrilling F1 movie trailer
AI writer
Coding AI tells developer to write it himself
Reacher looking down at another character from the Prime Video TV series Reacher
Reacher season 3 becomes Prime Video’s biggest returning show thanks to Hollywood’s biggest heavyweight
Finger Presses Orange Button Domain Name Registration on Black Keyboard Background. Closeup View
I visited the world’s first registered .com domain – and you won’t believe what it’s offering today
Image showing detail of the Leica D-Lux 8
Still can't get a Fujifilm X100VI? This premium Leica compact costs less, and it's in stock