This article is based on reporting originally published by InformationWeek. Some figures cited below are sourced from Gartner, Flexera, and a 2020 InformationWeek/Interop survey. Because the original source was a paginated slideshow, individual company details have been summarised from the overview text available.
The Cloud Market Keeps Growing — and Startups Are Leading the Charge
Even as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted large portions of the global economy in 2020, the cloud computing market showed remarkable resilience. Gartner forecast the public cloud market would grow 6.4% in 2020 to reach $242.7 billion, with Software as a Service (SaaS) accounting for roughly $104.7 billion of that total. A separate 2020 InformationWeek/Interop survey found that IT leaders estimated 42% of their cloud-related budgets were directed at SaaS initiatives.
Flexera’s 2020 State of the Cloud Report reinforced how pervasive cloud adoption had become: 96% of surveyed organisations were using public cloud services, and 76% had a private cloud environment in place. Cloud computing was no longer an emerging option — it had become the default operating model for enterprises and small businesses alike.
Why Cloud-Native Startups Matter
As cloud infrastructure matured, it created fertile ground for a new generation of companies built entirely around cloud primitives. These cloud-native startups did not need to migrate legacy systems or maintain on-premises hardware — they could design their products from the ground up for elasticity, distributed architecture, and pay-as-you-go economics.
This structural advantage allowed them to challenge established vendors in categories such as backup and recovery, enterprise networking, security, and relational databases — often delivering the same capabilities at lower cost and with greater agility. Investors took notice: many of the most prominent cloud-native startups raised hundreds of millions of dollars in venture funding.
Selection Criteria
InformationWeek compiled its list of ten notable cloud startups using the following criteria:
- Founded in 2015 or later — ensuring the companies were genuinely cloud-era businesses rather than incumbents that had adopted cloud features.
- Cloud-related product or service — each company had to offer something directly tied to cloud infrastructure, platforms, or applications.
- Significant funding — the candidate pool was drawn from the highest-funded cloud startups tracked by Crunchbase at the time of publication.
- Ranked by total funding received — companies are listed in descending order of capital raised, not by subjective merit.
Key Technology Themes Among These Startups
While each company on the list has its own focus area, several common themes emerge across the group:
Cloud Meets IoT and Edge Computing
Several startups combine cloud-native architectures with Internet of Things (IoT) and edge computing capabilities. Rather than processing all data in a central cloud region, these platforms push computation closer to where data is generated — reducing latency and bandwidth costs while still leveraging cloud-scale management and analytics.
Reinventing Traditional IT with Cloud Economics
Other companies on the list take familiar IT disciplines — backup and disaster recovery, enterprise networking, identity and access management, and relational databases — and rebuild them as cloud-native services. The result is typically a consumption-based pricing model, automated operations, and integrations with major cloud providers such as AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud.
Robotics and Automation
Some startups extend the cloud’s reach into physical operations, using cloud-connected robotics and automation platforms to bring software-defined control to warehouses, manufacturing floors, and logistics networks.
What This Means for DevOps and Platform Teams
For DevOps engineers and platform architects, the growth of cloud-native startups has practical implications:
- More specialised tooling: As startups target narrow problem spaces, teams gain access to purpose-built tools rather than trying to adapt general-purpose platforms.
- Vendor consolidation risk: Many well-funded startups are acquisition targets. Evaluate long-term vendor viability before standardising on a startup’s platform.
- Integration complexity: Cloud-native tools often assume a multi-cloud or hybrid environment. Review integration support for your specific stack before committing.
- Pricing model shifts: Consumption-based pricing can reduce upfront costs but introduces budget unpredictability. Implement cloud cost monitoring from day one.
Where to Learn More
The original InformationWeek slideshow, authored by Cynthia Harvey, provides individual profiles of each company including their founding story, core product, and funding history. For the most current funding data, consult Crunchbase directly, as startup valuations and funding rounds change frequently. Flexera publishes an annual State of the Cloud Report that tracks enterprise cloud adoption trends and is worth reviewing each year as a benchmark for your own organisation’s cloud maturity.
Original reporting by Cynthia Harvey for InformationWeek. Data points sourced from Gartner, Flexera, and a 2020 InformationWeek/Interop survey.