Evans Data has released the results of a new study that indicates that software developers view Google as the company most capable of executing in a public cloud setting, and they view IBM as best for the private cloud.Evans Data has released
the results of a new study that indicates that software developers view
Google as the company most capable of executing in a public cloud
setting and they view IBM as best for the private cloud.
The survey, conducted in September, measured developers perceptions
of leading vendors in the cloud space including Amazon, Microsoft,
AT&T, Rackspace, VMware, Sun, and HP, among others. Adoption,
adoption intentions, completeness of offering, and ability to execute
were rated by the developers along with capabilities such as security,
scalability, low latency, reliability, no vendor lock-in, and
cost-to-value ratio. In addition, developers positioned the
vendors as better suited to either public or private cloud offerings.
"The cloud environment is currently very dynamic both in terms of
development and vendor offerings, said Janel Garvin of Evans Data and
author of the report. Many are evolving their cloud services to span
both public and private clouds and well soon see some interesting
competitors vying across the spectrum as cloud becomes more pervasive.
Amazon was seen as having the most complete solution today, but
Google was thought to have more ability to execute, and Google topped
Amazon in most other categories, Evans officials said. Additionally,
adoption intentions in the next 12 months were much stronger for Google
than for Amazon. IBM was thought to be able to provide the most
secure cloud environment and was also rated high in reliability and
ability to execute qualities essential to large enterprises
considering private or hybrid clouds, Evans Data officials said.
"Google is likely to be the top performer in the public cloud
space," Garvin said in the report. "Amazon, who was first to market in
the public cloud space, now shares the leadership position for publicly
accessible clouds with Google. However, Google shows more strength in
both perceived capabilities and perceived ability to execute, and the
adoption patterns for Google are stronger going into the future."
Regarding IBM, Garvin said:
"For private clouds, IBM has already taken the lead perceptually,
and is in an excellent position to dominate the market going into the
future. This is especially true amongst the largest corporations who
are most likely already IBM customers, as well as those who want the
security and reliability of a vendor with an established reputation for
excellence in the large enterprise space. IBM offers private cloud
services built behind the customer's firewall and will even run those
services for customers, providing the same kind of management that
public clouds provide but without the security risk. They also provide
pre-integrated cloud appliances that make private cloud setup easy."
Moreover, Garvin added, "The two companies that truly straddle the
cloud worlds, AT&T and Microsoft, both have excellent potential:
through existing physical infrastructure in the case of AT&T or as
in the case of Microsoft, by virtue of a prodigious developer network
and well known software capabilities. But, both are late to the party.
And, in a market that's evolving as quickly as this one, that's a
significant handicap."
IBM is considered to be the company capable of providing the best
security, according to the survey. Indeed, 21.7 percent of respondents
said they believe IBM offers the best security for cloud environments,
but Amazon came in right behind IBM with 20.2 percent of respondents
saying they believed Amazon could provide the best security.
Regarding scalability, Google far outpaced others, with 31 percent
of respondents saying they view Google as providing the most scalable
offering, followed by Amazon with 17.8 percent, Microsoft with 10.9
percent, and IBM with 8.9 percent.
"Google has been perfecting scalability across multiple datacenters
and has demonstrated deep proficiency in this respect," Garvin said.
Meanwhile, 29 percent of developers surveyed said they think Google
offers the most reliable cloud platform, while 17.3 percent listed IBM,
16.9 percent listed Amazon, 8.1 percent listed VMware and 7.3 percent
listed Microsoft as most reliable.
Also, developers ranked Google as the best cloud platform to avoid
vendor lock-in, followed by Amazon, Sun Microsystems and VMware,
Microsoft came out in the middle of the pack and IBM came in dead last.
Of these results, Garvin said:
"Although there should be some concern about the proprietary nature
of Google's Big Table database, developers were nonetheless most
assured that Google would avoid locking them into their technology. The
odd thing here is that AT&T and IBM scored so poorly. Both are
building their cloud structures on open technologies, which should
result in little to no vendor lock-in."
The survey report, which is free with registration, can be found
here:
http://www.evansdata.com/research/market_alerts_start.php.
Cloud Computing 
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