10 most influential companies in Cloud Computing

Translation of the article “10 Important Companies in Cloud Computing” .

In this small article we would like to bring to your attention a rating of 10 companies that are in the leading roles in the field of cloud computing, we will also try to explain why they are among the top ten.

On Habré almost daily posts are created on the subject of clouds, special attention is paid to real sharks of this sphere such as Microsoft and Amazon , but not everyone knows about other companies. For example, Verizon , did you know that this telecommunications giant began to master the sphere of cloud computing?

More than a hundred articles have already been written about the popularity and relevance of the “clouds”, so we will skip this part and proceed directly to our publication.

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10th place - Verizon

In early 2011, Verizon acquired, specializing in colocation and cloud services, Terremark for $ 1.4 billion. It is not surprising that this transaction was recognized as one of the most breakthrough in the history of cloud computing, given its cost.

Cleverly taking advantage of this situation, Verizon was able to lure John Considine, co-founder and technical director of Terremark, also known as the founder of Cloud Switch , a Cloud Startup company, which, by the way, was also purchased by Verizon.
Not bad, is it?

Most likely, in the “Mergers and Acquisitions” rating, this company would have fought for the leading positions :)

9th place - VMware

The presence of VMware on this list may be surprising to some of you. But if you look at their future projects and notice what they are going to bring to the cloud computing industry, you will be surprised even more.

And you know, this is despite the fact that the company does not offer any cloud services. Perhaps you are wondering: “What the hell is this company in the top ten?”
The fact is that their vCloud software is a sufficient argument to claim the title of the best company in the cloud marketing business. vCloud Director 1.5 acts as an intermediary for enterprises in accessing private or public cloud systems. VMware claims that about 100 “clouds” can be created using vCloud.
I wonder what awaits this company in the near future? Does it grow into something more?

8th place - Linode

If you ask Linux users about their favorite cloud provider, then don't be surprised if you get the same answers. Yes, it will be Linode , which deservedly takes its 8th place in our ranking of cloud companies.

Linode creates “clouds” at fixed costs by the so-called Virtual Private Servers or simply VPS, which are definitely the opposite of the pay-as-you-go model.
As the users themselves point out, Linode is one of the fastest VPS that can be found, as well as an almost perfect balance between quality and price.

7 places - Salesforce.com

In IT, this company has been known for over 10 years.
It is believed that the emergence of the first technology, close to the modern understanding of the term "cloud computing", is attributed to the company Salesforce.com , founded in 1999.

At the moment, Salesforce has a good start in order to make a big step forward. Like most large companies, Salesforce also resorted to mergers. For example, a little more than a year ago they acquired a hosting platform for Ruby developers - Heroku for $ 212 million. Heroku focuses on the ease of introducing new services, allowing customers to focus their efforts on developing and maintaining their own applications.
With this deal, Salesforce acquired not only Heroku technologies and their intellectual assets, but also famous Ruby applications that allow Salesforce to take a confident position in the sphere of cloud computing.

6th place - Citrix Systems

Citrix is another company that confidently occupies one of the leading positions among cloud service providers.
In addition, Citrix is ​​developing cloud-based software, and in recent years, virtualization developers, including leaders such as VMware, Microsoft, etc., have attracted more and more attention

It is worth saying that after acquiring Cloud.com for $ 200 million , Citrix made a big leap, as it gave them much-needed access to the open source world.
Later, Citrix presented the Cloud Stack (data center management console), which made them the best on the open source cloud technology market.

5th place - Red Hat

The presence of Red Hat in our list may cause you controversial feelings, since many, to put it mildly, do not sympathize with this company, and besides, their main OpenShift platform uses Amazon servers instead of their own.
But the reason why Red Hat was in our ranking is their huge popularity among Linux users.

As for OpenShift, it helps users upload their apps to Amazon in the easiest way possible.
Why is OpenShift so popular among Linux users?
The fact is that the software is provided free of charge, and therefore Red Hat is a direct competitor to companies such as VMware and Citrix.

4th place - Google

Recently, Google has achieved great technological success, especially in the field of cloud technologies.
Not so long ago, they presented the public with Google App Engine , whose users can develop and download their applications written in Java and Python.
Currently, Google Cloud Storage is the most preferred alternative to Amazon S3 for enterprises.
Services such as Google Drive, Google Cloud Print, and Google Cloud Connect are just a small part of the cloud services the company plans to launch in the near future.
Not to mention ChromeOS , where every user can run applications from the cloud.

3rd place - Microsoft

Despite some setbacks, this company still remains one of the best in the field of cloud computing.
Its platform for creating web applications and services - Microsoft Azure has millions of fans around the world.

What do you think is behind Azure's popularity?
No, this is not some kind of space software, in the development of which Darth Vader himself took part.
It's very simple - relatively low prices, especially compared to competitors such as Amazon.
It is worth noting another interesting feature that Microsoft Azure offers us - streaming video broadcasting.
Have you heard that Azure is preparing to enter the Linux platform? To tell the truth, for now this is only a rumor, but you just imagine what piece of the cloudy pie will bite off Microsoft.
It is worth saying that today Microsoft offers the user some of the best cloud services such as Hotmail, Skydrive and the Office 365 cloud application for enterprises of any size.
UTD: Microsoft has already released an Azure update that supports Linux.

2 place - Rackspace

Rackspace gained fame through the use of open source methods to create "clouds".
The emergence of OpenStack allowed Rackspace to become the leader in the open source market.
What is the role of this cloud computing company?
Most likely, Rackspace in the cloud market is like Android in the OS market for mobile devices.
Let's talk about the most significant event for Rackspace - about its collaboration with NASA , which resulted in the creation of one of the best cloud software to date.
Rackspace is not going to rest on its laurels. Today, this company is looking for new ideas, and invites the best programmers from around the world. Ultimately, this should lead to an improvement in OpenStack. Thank you Rackspace for this :)

1st place - Amazon

The company , which was created to sell books, suddenly turned into something more and forever changed the world of the IT industry.
Today, we can safely say that Amazon, known for its cutting-edge cloud computing ideas and strategies, has been and remains the absolute leader in this area.

The Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the best cloud service provider. Amazingly, over the past 6 years, Amazon has significantly reduced the prices of its services. According to the company, it helps to keep customers.
At the end of 2011, net sales of Amazon amounted to $ 48.08 billion, in 2010 the figure was at $ 34.2 billion.

UTD: I wonder why Oracle and Parallels were not included in this list?
Maybe someone else is missing from this list?