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Who is the internal competitor to Google Cloud?

by Touche 7y ago

bryanrasmussen 7y ago
anyone who will get money if Google Cloud doesn't, or anyone who doesn't like whoever is running Google Cloud or thinks that anyone associated with Google Cloud that pulls it off will be a competitor for the next raise in level etc. etc. This is like corporate infighting for comedies set in the 50s really.
fred_is_fred 7y ago
In any enterprise competitor doesn't mean a similar product, it means any unit who can get headcount, budget etc. Google said in Q3 that they were spending a ton to grow cloud - which makes all the other kingdom building VPs concerned - they are the competition. Youtube, Gsuite, Ads, whatever else google hasn't abandoned that they charge for.
prepend 7y ago
I don’t think Google internally uses GCP. So a direct competitor would be whoever runs the “real” google cloud that all the internal stuff.
- Touche 7y ago
  Wait, what? GCP isn't just the productization of their internal infrastructure?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - vrc 7y ago
    No. Some parts but the OSS stuff released before was more in line with what the company uses. Google doesn’t require dogfooding of GCP.
  - mulmen 7y ago
    Neither is AWS, or Azure. Cloud platforms are their own product. Only one company needs Google's internal infrastructure. That company is called Google. The lessons learned in building those systems can be applied to more generalized solutions which can be sold as standalone products.
    - Touche 7y ago
      I don't doubt that Amazon.com runs on its own dedicated "installation" of AWS, but are you saying that it doesn't run on AWS at all? That doesn't jive with the infamous "API mandate" email that Bezos wrote that essentially kicked off AWS. Have I been misunderstanding that email all along?
      - mulmen 7y ago
        If you think the API mandate necessitated or created AWS then yes, you misunderstand that memo. The API memo simply mandated a service-oriented architecture. That can run on any compute and indeed predates AWS by several years. The origins of AWS are entirely unrelated, Amazon simply realized it was good at operating infrastructure. This led to the conception of offering infrastructure as a service. The initial AWS service offerings were built based on Amazon's experience and expertise but were not the literal internal services of Amazon. See https://www.networkworld.com/article/2891297/the-myth-about-how-amazon-s-web-service-started-just-won-t-die.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2891297/the-myth-about-... for more historical details. Amazon (or Google, or Microsoft) is an anomaly, the things Amazon needs to operate Amazon.com are very very different from what most companies need. The internal services and architecture are purpose built although today they do heavily leverage AWS under the hood. Amazon.com is just a customer of AWS, there's no special installation. Almost nobody needs Amazon.com's infrastructure (except Amazon) or could even afford to staff it. What people do need are generalized, managed services they can combine for their own use cases.
        Touche 7y ago
        I'm confused because on the one hand you say that their needs are very different and then on the other hand you say that they are using AWS. Another commenter also pointed out that they are using AWS. I think the only needs that are likely different are scale, so bigger instances, and the fact that they have a massive legacy infrastructure that can't be easily migrated off of. So that's pretty much what I would expect; Amazon.com does use AWS for new stuff but is still operating a lot of legacy as well.
  - stingraycharles 7y ago
    Most of them were either complete rewrites or products that didn’t exist internally. Eg they internally use Borg and not kubernetes.
  - kerng 7y ago
    That's normal progression. Hardly anyone at Microsoft used Azure in the beginning either, it takes a few years for teams to move infra and deprecate old stuff. Same for Amazon, it took them very long also, including dedicated internal projects with focus on moving. But majority of Amazon and Microsoft workloads now run on their respective cloud offerings. Google is probably still be at least 3-5 years before that would happen be aligned. GCP is quite immature and young, which this leak highlights also. I assume this would mean that also internal teams at Google won't be moving workloads to GCP.
- ec109685 7y ago
  Good point. Google using GCP internally would be strong validation of the product and I think add more comfort for enterprising adopting it. E.g. what coup would be for Google Search to run on GCP. Imagine the CIO conversation of, “well, if it is good enough for google search, it must be good for me”.

Who is the internal competitor to Google Cloud?

by Touche 7y ago

Who is the internal competitor to Google Cloud?

anyone who will get money if Google Cloud doesn't, or anyone who doesn't like whoever is running Google Cloud or thinks that anyone associated with Google Cloud that pulls it off will be a competitor for the next raise in level etc. etc. This is like corporate infighting for comedies set in the 50s really.

fred_is_fred 7y ago

In any enterprise competitor doesn't mean a similar product, it means any unit who can get headcount, budget etc. Google said in Q3 that they were spending a ton to grow cloud - which makes all the other kingdom building VPs concerned - they are the competition. Youtube, Gsuite, Ads, whatever else google hasn't abandoned that they charge for.

prepend 7y ago

I don’t think Google internally uses GCP. So a direct competitor would be whoever runs the “real” google cloud that all the internal stuff.

Touche 7y ago
Wait, what? GCP isn't just the productization of their internal infrastructure?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- vrc 7y ago
  No. Some parts but the OSS stuff released before was more in line with what the company uses. Google doesn’t require dogfooding of GCP.
- mulmen 7y ago
  Neither is AWS, or Azure. Cloud platforms are their own product. Only one company needs Google's internal infrastructure. That company is called Google. The lessons learned in building those systems can be applied to more generalized solutions which can be sold as standalone products.
  - Touche 7y ago
    I don't doubt that Amazon.com runs on its own dedicated "installation" of AWS, but are you saying that it doesn't run on AWS at all? That doesn't jive with the infamous "API mandate" email that Bezos wrote that essentially kicked off AWS. Have I been misunderstanding that email all along?
    - mulmen 7y ago
      If you think the API mandate necessitated or created AWS then yes, you misunderstand that memo. The API memo simply mandated a service-oriented architecture. That can run on any compute and indeed predates AWS by several years. The origins of AWS are entirely unrelated, Amazon simply realized it was good at operating infrastructure. This led to the conception of offering infrastructure as a service. The initial AWS service offerings were built based on Amazon's experience and expertise but were not the literal internal services of Amazon. See https://www.networkworld.com/article/2891297/the-myth-about-how-amazon-s-web-service-started-just-won-t-die.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2891297/the-myth-about-... for more historical details. Amazon (or Google, or Microsoft) is an anomaly, the things Amazon needs to operate Amazon.com are very very different from what most companies need. The internal services and architecture are purpose built although today they do heavily leverage AWS under the hood. Amazon.com is just a customer of AWS, there's no special installation. Almost nobody needs Amazon.com's infrastructure (except Amazon) or could even afford to staff it. What people do need are generalized, managed services they can combine for their own use cases.
      - Touche 7y ago
        I'm confused because on the one hand you say that their needs are very different and then on the other hand you say that they are using AWS. Another commenter also pointed out that they are using AWS. I think the only needs that are likely different are scale, so bigger instances, and the fact that they have a massive legacy infrastructure that can't be easily migrated off of. So that's pretty much what I would expect; Amazon.com does use AWS for new stuff but is still operating a lot of legacy as well.
- stingraycharles 7y ago
  Most of them were either complete rewrites or products that didn’t exist internally. Eg they internally use Borg and not kubernetes.
- kerng 7y ago
  That's normal progression. Hardly anyone at Microsoft used Azure in the beginning either, it takes a few years for teams to move infra and deprecate old stuff. Same for Amazon, it took them very long also, including dedicated internal projects with focus on moving. But majority of Amazon and Microsoft workloads now run on their respective cloud offerings. Google is probably still be at least 3-5 years before that would happen be aligned. GCP is quite immature and young, which this leak highlights also. I assume this would mean that also internal teams at Google won't be moving workloads to GCP.
ec109685 7y ago
Good point. Google using GCP internally would be strong validation of the product and I think add more comfort for enterprising adopting it. E.g. what coup would be for Google Search to run on GCP. Imagine the CIO conversation of, “well, if it is good enough for google search, it must be good for me”.