4 ms·

How much money Google estimates Microsoft’s cloud business is losing

29 points by SirLJ 4y ago

LegitShady 4y ago
google is an expert at losing $5+ billion a year on cloud platform - they did it last year, so i guess if anyone outside of msft might know its google.
charles_f 4y ago
So Google employees estimate that MSFT which reports its cloud revenue, is lying, and in fact they, who don't report their cloud revenue, are almost second. This is based on leaked Google estimates themselves based on leaked Microsoft estimates. Neither very data driven nor super newsworthy if you ask me. I am also wondering where the missing loses (if they exist) are going to in the accounts. Now, the one thing that has always been true is that each of the players in cloud jerrymander their reports in a way that always places them ahead of the competition. First in education for companies in Venezuela under 300 people. First in serverless technology with storage for JavaScript. This newspiece doesn't really explain what is the angle they've been looking at
- jdsully 4y ago
  You’re talking about revenue, while Google is talking about profit. They are not the same number.
  - LegitShady 4y ago
    google doesn't even know what cloud profit is. It's heard about it from amazon, but no one at google has ever seen it themselves. Too busy shutting down services.
  - charles_f 4y ago
    Nevertheless companies report profit, if Microsoft is masking its cloud losses it means they're inputing it elsewhere. While I said revenue, I'm talking about profit
- riku_iki 4y ago
  > MSFT which reports its cloud revenue, is lying, and in fact they, who don't report their cloud revenue I think it is opposite: - google reports cloud revenue - MSFT doesn't report cloud. their "intelligent cloud" includes sql server, win server licenses etc, it is on page 26: https://microsoft.gcs-web.com/static-files/18f9f1e3-cb6f-4a6a-a505-5c54896de361 https://microsoft.gcs-web.com/static-files/18f9f1e3-cb6f-4a6...
_8j50 4y ago
If you are a windows bigcorp, you will use Azure. It would be very painful if you don't because you will not use Azure AD and O365 will be hard to use (is it even possible without azure?) plus your AD stuff can be synced with Azure AD so you can easily manage cloud resource permissions. If most companies use aws or gcp that will be in addition to Azure. In the long term, MS would have to try very hard to lose more money in Azure than GCP in my opinion. It's like edge being a default browser except with millions of dollars od corporate spending per company.
- LegitShady 4y ago
  not sure why you're being downvoted - o365 bigcorps are everywhere and most do use azure.
- SvenL 4y ago
  That’s exactly the point. They also use it to influence the number of Azure customers. If you purchase a O365 subscription you have an Azure AD tenant and an Azure Subscription. So you’re also an Azure customer.
Moissanite 4y ago
The fact that MS buys its business to give the impression of keeping up with AWS is not a secret - they can afford to do so by rebalancing revenue from Office and other cloud-adjacent productivity sales. GCP doesn't have that particular lever to pull, so is stuck with lower margins - accepting that ought to play out well for them in the long run if they drive prices down and become competitive that way, but Google has burned so much faith in its non-advertising products that you'd have to be a lunatic to adopt GCP as your first choice at this point.

29 points by SirLJ 4y ago

google is an expert at losing $5+ billion a year on cloud platform - they did it last year, so i guess if anyone outside of msft might know its google.

charles_f 4y ago

So Google employees estimate that MSFT which reports its cloud revenue, is lying, and in fact they, who don't report their cloud revenue, are almost second. This is based on leaked Google estimates themselves based on leaked Microsoft estimates. Neither very data driven nor super newsworthy if you ask me. I am also wondering where the missing loses (if they exist) are going to in the accounts. Now, the one thing that has always been true is that each of the players in cloud jerrymander their reports in a way that always places them ahead of the competition. First in education for companies in Venezuela under 300 people. First in serverless technology with storage for JavaScript. This newspiece doesn't really explain what is the angle they've been looking at

jdsully 4y ago
You’re talking about revenue, while Google is talking about profit. They are not the same number.
- LegitShady 4y ago
  google doesn't even know what cloud profit is. It's heard about it from amazon, but no one at google has ever seen it themselves. Too busy shutting down services.
- charles_f 4y ago
  Nevertheless companies report profit, if Microsoft is masking its cloud losses it means they're inputing it elsewhere. While I said revenue, I'm talking about profit
riku_iki 4y ago
> MSFT which reports its cloud revenue, is lying, and in fact they, who don't report their cloud revenue I think it is opposite: - google reports cloud revenue - MSFT doesn't report cloud. their "intelligent cloud" includes sql server, win server licenses etc, it is on page 26: https://microsoft.gcs-web.com/static-files/18f9f1e3-cb6f-4a6a-a505-5c54896de361 https://microsoft.gcs-web.com/static-files/18f9f1e3-cb6f-4a6...

_8j50 4y ago

If you are a windows bigcorp, you will use Azure. It would be very painful if you don't because you will not use Azure AD and O365 will be hard to use (is it even possible without azure?) plus your AD stuff can be synced with Azure AD so you can easily manage cloud resource permissions. If most companies use aws or gcp that will be in addition to Azure. In the long term, MS would have to try very hard to lose more money in Azure than GCP in my opinion. It's like edge being a default browser except with millions of dollars od corporate spending per company.

LegitShady 4y ago
not sure why you're being downvoted - o365 bigcorps are everywhere and most do use azure.
SvenL 4y ago
That’s exactly the point. They also use it to influence the number of Azure customers. If you purchase a O365 subscription you have an Azure AD tenant and an Azure Subscription. So you’re also an Azure customer.

Moissanite 4y ago

The fact that MS buys its business to give the impression of keeping up with AWS is not a secret - they can afford to do so by rebalancing revenue from Office and other cloud-adjacent productivity sales. GCP doesn't have that particular lever to pull, so is stuck with lower margins - accepting that ought to play out well for them in the long run if they drive prices down and become competitive that way, but Google has burned so much faith in its non-advertising products that you'd have to be a lunatic to adopt GCP as your first choice at this point.