This article is based on reporting originally published by RFI (rfi.fr) in February 2020. Market figures reflect the state of the industry at that time.
What Is Cloud Computing and Why Does It Matter?
Cloud computing has quietly become one of the most consequential infrastructure shifts in the history of technology. While most users never see it, the cloud underpins an enormous share of everyday digital activity — from streaming music and video to posting on social media, requesting a ride, and collaborating on documents across continents.
Rather than storing data or running software on a local device, cloud computing moves those workloads to large, professionally managed data centers. Users access computing power, storage, and software over the network — typically the internet — on demand and at scale.
Core Use Cases
The growth of cloud adoption has run in parallel with the expansion of 4G broadband and smartphone penetration. Together, fast networks and remote servers make the following possible for individuals and organizations:
- Media streaming: Music and video services offload encoding, storage, and delivery to the cloud, letting users stream on demand from any device.
- Remote and hybrid work: Productivity suites, communication tools, and file sharing platforms run in the cloud, enabling teams distributed across time zones to collaborate in real time.
- Social media and ride-hailing: Real-time map updates, user-generated content at scale, and instant notifications all depend on cloud back-ends.
- Cloud storage: Individuals and businesses alike store documents, photos, and backups without maintaining local hardware.
- Cloud gaming: Games with demanding graphics and physics engines can run on remote servers, streaming rendered frames to players. This removes the need for expensive, rapidly-outdated consumer hardware.
- Enterprise software (SaaS): CRM, ERP, HR, and analytics platforms are increasingly delivered as cloud services rather than on-premises installations.
Deployment Models: Public, Private, and Hybrid Cloud
Organizations choose from several cloud deployment models depending on their cost, compliance, and flexibility requirements:
- Public cloud: Infrastructure is owned and operated by a third-party provider (such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud) and shared across many customers. It offers elastic scaling, broad service catalogs, and a pay-as-you-go pricing model.
- Private cloud: Infrastructure is dedicated to a single organization, either hosted on-premises or in a colocation facility. It provides greater control and can simplify compliance with data-residency regulations.
- Hybrid cloud: A combination of public and private environments, connected to allow workloads to move between them. This is the model most large enterprises have settled on, balancing the cost and agility of public cloud with the security and control of private infrastructure.
According to analyst Bob O’Donnell, president and chief analyst at TECHnalysis Research, companies on average use approximately three different public-cloud providers — a pattern often called multi-cloud. O’Donnell also noted that while cloud-native companies are well established, many traditional businesses were still in the early stages of migration as of early 2020.
Market Size and Growth
As of early 2020, the public cloud market was expanding rapidly:
- Gartner projected the global public cloud market would reach approximately $266 billion in 2020, representing roughly 17 percent year-over-year growth.
- IDC forecast the market would nearly double to around $500 billion by 2023.
Note: These are projections made in early 2020. Actual figures will have evolved since publication.
Major Cloud Providers and Market Share
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
AWS launched in 2006 and established a commanding early lead in cloud infrastructure. As of early 2020, analysts estimated its share of the global public-cloud market at between 30 and 50 percent. AWS reported 2019 revenues of $35 billion and claims millions of active customers worldwide.
Microsoft Azure
Microsoft is the second-largest cloud provider, with Azure holding an estimated 15 percent market share as of early 2020. Microsoft does not break out Azure revenue as a standalone figure, making precise comparisons difficult, but the cloud division has consistently been Microsoft’s fastest-growing and highest-performing business unit.
A notable development at the time: the US Department of Defense awarded Microsoft its Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) contract — worth up to $10 billion over ten years — in October 2019. Amazon disputed the award and sought a court injunction; a federal court temporarily halted work on the contract while the matter was under review.
Google Cloud
Google Cloud held approximately five to six percent of the public cloud market as of early 2020. The company reported $9 billion in Google Cloud revenues for 2019, representing roughly 53 percent year-over-year growth. Google’s cloud strategy emphasizes large-scale data analytics, machine learning capabilities, and tools that facilitate workload portability across multiple cloud environments (multi-cloud and hybrid-cloud interoperability).
Alibaba Cloud
China’s Alibaba Cloud also held around five to six percent of the global market at the time, making it the fourth-largest provider and the dominant player in the Asia-Pacific region.
Key Technology Trends Shaping Cloud’s Future
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
All major cloud providers have invested heavily in managed AI and machine learning services. The scale of cloud infrastructure makes it practical to train large models and run inference workloads that would be prohibitively expensive on-premises. The JEDI contract, for instance, explicitly included AI-driven modernization of US military computing systems as a core objective.
Cybersecurity
Cloud providers’ reputations depend on their ability to protect customer data. All major providers invest substantially in physical security, encryption, identity management, and compliance certifications. For many organizations, delegating security to a specialized cloud provider results in a stronger security posture than they could achieve independently.
Edge Computing
As 5G networks roll out and connected devices proliferate — in vehicles, factories, homes, and cities — there is growing demand to process data close to where it is generated rather than routing it to a distant data center. This approach, known as edge computing, reduces latency and bandwidth consumption and is considered essential for applications such as autonomous vehicles and industrial automation.
Cloud providers have been partnering with telecommunications companies to bring compute capacity closer to users. AWS partnered with Verizon, and Microsoft with AT&T, to support edge deployments that extend cloud services to the network edge.
Environmental Considerations
Large-scale data centers consume significant amounts of electricity, primarily for cooling and powering servers. As cloud adoption grows, so does scrutiny of its environmental impact. Major providers have announced goals around renewable energy sourcing and improving power usage effectiveness (PUE). Consolidating workloads in efficient hyperscale data centers can also reduce per-workload energy consumption compared with running equivalent workloads across many smaller, less efficient on-premises environments.
Summary
Cloud computing is no longer an emerging technology — it is foundational infrastructure. For DevOps and platform engineering teams, the practical implications are significant: the cloud enables faster provisioning, infrastructure-as-code, global distribution, managed services that reduce operational overhead, and the ability to scale capacity to match demand. Understanding the competitive landscape, deployment models, and emerging trends such as edge computing and AI integration is essential for making informed architectural decisions.