Welcome to the Cloud Wars Minute — your daily cloud news and commentary show. Each episode provides insights and perspectives around the “reimagination machine” that is the cloud.
In today’s Cloud Wars Minute, I take a look at how Oracle has surged ahead in the global race for cloud regions.
Highlights
00:21 — Incredible demand for cloud services is leading to more cloud data centers being built, which is leading to more cloud regions. It turns out that, as far as cloud regions around the world — not availability zones, but cloud regions — Oracle is by far the leader, with Microsoft in second place, Google in third, and AWS fourth.
01:09 — Oracle is number one with 101 cloud regions. Microsoft has more than 60; Google has 42; and AWS has 36. Now the number of cloud regions doesn’t correspond directly to who’s biggest in revenue. Google Cloud has been growing rapidly, and it would probably be ranked third in revenue. Microsoft is either a close second or first. AWS and Oracle would be at the bottom.
02:17 — Oracle’s build-out of these cloud regions also shows that it has a different strategy.Oracle says that while Microsoft, Google Cloud, and AWS are all building a very small number of very large cloud data centers, Oracle has taken the opposite approach — building a large number of small cloud data centers that have full capabilities.
AI Agent & Copilot Summit is an AI-first event to define opportunities, impact, and outcomes with Microsoft Copilot and agents. Building on its 2025 success, the 2026 event takes place March 16-18 in San Diego. Get more details.
03:17 — Oracle is betting that it will continue to grow faster than its three competitors because of its technological advantage and because it’s able to get more regions up around the world. Oracle CEO Safra Catz, said, “It’s really just a matter of time until we at Oracle have more cloud regions than all of our big three competitors combined.”
04:28 — In addition to building these relatively small cloud data centers, Oracle is also embarking on a wildly ambitious plan to build some of the largest of what Ellison calls AI data centers in the world. On top of that, Oracle is also a partner in the Stargate effort with OpenAI and SoftBank, which will also include some staggering numbers.
05:00 — I would expect that Oracle would build — or add — 10 or 15 more cloud regions this year. But who knows? It’ll be interesting to see if the other three companies here choose to try to build out some smaller data centers, or if they’ll continue to go with their current plan.
