The origin of cloud computing
Nothing can appear out of thin air. The emergence of cloud computing is inseparable from the technological development of many related fields. Among them, the time-sharing system has to be mentioned. This was proposed by McCarthy, the father of artificial intelligence, when he was working at MIT in 1958 The proposal to transform the batch processing mode of the computer into a time-sharing mode that can allow dozens or even hundreds of users at the same time, proposes to provide computing power to users as a public utility like water and electricity (this is at an exorbitant price). The mainframe era was the seemingly only way out for computer ubiquity). Of course, since the Internet only appeared after 1969, it was impossible to imagine sitting at home and using the resources of the mainframe. At that time, what I thought was that multiple sets of peripheral terminals share the server resources in time-sharing, that is, a large Machine access to multiple sets of peripherals.
It is said that the proposal of the time-sharing system is of great significance because the virtualization and cloud computing that appeared later have the concept and shadow of the time-sharing system.
The first milestone of cloud computing is that in 1999, Salesforce.com proposed the concept of providing enterprise-level applications to enterprises through a website, and launched CRM products delivered through the Internet (Salesforce specializes in CRM software, and it is still very good now).
Another important development is that in 2002, Amazon (Amazon) provided a set of Web Services including storage space, computing power and even artificial intelligence and other resource services. In 2005, Amazon proposed the Elastic Compute Cloud (Elastic Compute Cloud), also known as Amazon EC2, a Web Service that allows small businesses and private individuals to rent Amazon's computers to run their own applications.
On August 9, 2006, Google CEO Eric Schmidt first proposed the concept of "Cloud Computing" at the Search Engine Conference (SES San Jose 2006).
So far, the name Cloud Computing has been gradually accepted and promoted by the industry.
Second cloud computing market structure
In terms of the global public cloud service market, according to Gartner's 2017 survey, Amazon Cloud (AWS) and Microsoft Cloud (Azure) are the two major players in the public cloud market, accounting for 47.1% and 10% of the market share, followed by It's Google Cloud (3.95%) and IBM Softlayer (2.77%).
In the domestic public cloud service market, according to IDC data, Alibaba Cloud's IaaS revenue in the first half of 2017 was US$500 million, accounting for 47.6% of the Chinese market share; Tencent Cloud ranked second, with revenue of about US$100 million and a share of 9.6% ; Kingsoft Cloud ranked third, with revenue of $68.39 million, with a share of 6.5%; China Telecom ranked fourth with revenue of $62.54 million, with a share of 6%; Ucloud revenue of $57.74 million, ranked fifth, with a share of 5.5%.
After comparing the global and domestic cloud service markets, we found many striking similarities. First, the global cloud service leader Amazon accounted for nearly 47.1% of the global cloud service market, while the domestic leader Alibaba Cloud accounted for the domestic cloud service market. At the same time, the market share of the two bosses has increased significantly, Amazon has increased by nearly 3 percentage points from 44.2% in 2016, and Alibaba Cloud's share in the domestic cloud service market is on the basis of 2016. increased by about 7 percentage points. From the data point of view, although cloud service providers have sprung up recently, the trend of cloud service market share gradually concentrating to industry giants is still obvious. In the foreseeable future, the cloud service market will be intensified, and a large number of cloud service providers that lack advantages in features, scale, technology, and capital will be out of the market.
From the perspective of the market, this trend is actually reasonable. The emergence of cloud, for customers, only use resources and no longer touch the underlying operation and maintenance. Although this reduces the customer's operation and maintenance pressure and basic investment in informatization, the black box-like delivery method also makes many customers feel for themselves. There are certain concerns about the information system and related business data of the cloud service provider. When the major cloud service providers hype their own services, many customers may face difficulties in choosing. This is because customers often can only choose from the brand, service scale and market share. to confirm the level of cloud service.
Three cloud service market differences
By comparing the global cloud service market and the domestic cloud service market, we can clearly find that there are obvious differences between the two.
Global cloud service segment market share:
Market share of domestic cloud service segments (borrowing data from Zhiyan Consulting):
Comparing the data of domestic and foreign cloud service markets, we find that the market share of SaaS in the global market has always been larger than the market share of IaaS, especially in the initial stage of cloud services. In the domestic market, the IaaS market has always occupied most of the market share.
From this, we can see that there are still differences in the main driving forces of domestic and foreign customers when using the cloud service market. Generally speaking, the cloud service market started early in foreign countries, and the entire cloud ecosystem is relatively complete. Some of them are very influential in the market. Quan's software company has been involved in the cloud service market earlier, so it has launched the corresponding SaaS service very early, and the acceptance of standard and procedural applications in foreign markets is relatively high, which also provides a prerequisite for the promotion of SaaS services. In the domestic market, because many software application system developers do not have the right to speak in the market as many foreign counterparts, and their SaaS services started late, it is still difficult to form a scale. At the same time, due to the wide variety of customization requirements for software application systems in the domestic market, it is difficult to apply the same set of processes and standards. Too many personalized requirements limit the rapid development of SaaS services. However, in the foreseeable future, the SaaS market of many application systems that are not sensitive to data security requirements and whose processes are basically the same will develop rapidly due to cost advantages.
The development direction of four cloud computing manufacturers
A digression before analysis I am very surprised that when the big players in the industry have not fully entered the market competition, their main energy is not on expanding their own technical advantages and barriers, and forming relevant industry standards. With the participation of major manufacturers in various industries, the market share of this manufacturer has shrunk sharply. In the author's opinion, in the face of no absolute advantage, the market share is far more important than the overall market size.
In the competition in the cloud service market, the above things still have considerable reference significance. The author believes that the leading brands of cloud service providers represented by Amazon and Ali should vigorously promote the technological leadership and de facto standards of cloud services. This priority should be higher than the promotion of market acceptance of cloud services, and strive to be generally recognized by the public. Before the cloud service form, expand its own technology and service advantages, and increase its own voice in the cloud service industry. Taking the domestic market as an example, although Alibaba Cloud is currently the dominant player, Alibaba should be fully vigilant in the face of cloud service challengers represented by Huawei. Although in markets such as individuals and Internet companies, Alibaba Cloud's advantages will continue for a long time. However, if large enterprises generally accept the form of cloud services in the future, the advantages of traditional manufacturers' marketing channels and marketing capabilities will be greatly demonstrated, and it remains to be seen who will have the last laugh.
For some small cloud service providers, with the increasingly fierce competition in the cloud service market, the days of cloud service providers lacking their own characteristics will become more and more difficult. For small cloud service providers, they must find their own positioning.
For example, if your target customers are companies that value security, can you focus on the concept of security? Based on the author's understanding of the current mainstream cloud service providers in the cloud service market, there is basically no one that can give customers very professional and affirmative security advice. This may also be due to their own avoidance of responsibility and worries that customers are overly concerned about security issues and give up the consideration of going to the cloud However, for security-conscious customers, I still feel that it is very necessary for customers to have a clear understanding of the security situation, including the security threats faced in the self-operated computer room. At the same time, there is a problem here. If an enterprise that is very concerned about security goes to the cloud, if the current security provision system of various cloud service providers is used, the cost of security services may far exceed customer expectations. At this time, can our cloud service provider come up with a basket of packaging solutions?
For some cloud service providers, there are no obvious advantages in terms of scale, strength, security, etc., can they make the service their own characteristics? For many large enterprises in the market, uncontrollable services are often unacceptable. For a certain business system, it does not mean that it cannot be interrupted at all, but if the processing process is uncontrollable after the interruption, the operation and maintenance department of large enterprises will face more stress and risk. Therefore, for this part of enterprises, it may be easier to accept that cloud service providers intervene in their daily operation and maintenance, and let them participate in the troubleshooting of their own systems on the cloud to a greater extent.
Five conclusions
As the next round of informatization, cloud services will be more and more accepted by enterprises, governments and individuals. In the next few years, it is not impossible that cloud services will become as common as mobile payment.