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 discuss Google Cloud’s remarkable growth under CEO Thomas Kurian
Highlights
00:35 — It was interesting the other day when Thomas Kurian, the CEO of Google Cloud, presented at a Goldman Sachs investors conference. One of the things that Kurian said there, which I think reveals a little bit about him and the company and how far they’ve come, is that six years ago, when he started at Google Cloud, he said, “Most people told me, ‘You don’t have a chance.’“
01:00 — Let me dispel a little bit about that and this resurgence that a lot of people said wouldn’t happen. Kurian said, “We are now Google Cloud, not all of Google, just Google Cloud.” He also said, “We’re the fourth-largest enterprise software company.“ I think they’re actually number three, and let me tell you how I thought about that.
01:54 — Microsoft is number one, total revenue was $64 billion. A lot of that is consumer, but a lot of it is also enterprise. Oracle saw total revenue, including cloud, of $13.3 billion. Google Cloud’s last quarter revenue was $10.35 billion. Then we get to Salesforce with $9.3 billion last quarter, and SAP at $9.2 billion last quarter. Even if you look at IBM, its software revenue in the most recent quarter was $6.7 billion. I think Google Cloud has moved up to number three.
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03:04 — We’ve seen this surge from Google Cloud. I’ve certainly talked over the last several months about how Google Cloud is now the fastest-growing company on the Cloud Wars Top 10 list. In Q1, it grew 28%, and in Q2, they grew 29%. As it gets bigger, its growth rate is accelerating, which is rare among the Top 10. AWS has done that too, though their numbers are about 10 points lower.
03:44 — The other point I wanted to make is about Kurian. I don’t know why there are people who feel the need to tell others what they can or cannot do, or why they will never achieve something. These individuals often tell others to lower their dreams and ambitions because they don’t believe they are capable. I despise that notion.
04:41 — I think this is such a great story and great proof of the opposite. If someone wants to say, “I don’t think I can do something,” that’s fine. Don’t do it. But don’t push that idea on others. There’s so much negativity in the world, and it often comes out in the media and other places. I think we’re in a world full of possibility and enormous potential.
