The cloud, from an intangible idea to an entire industrial sector

Perhaps the most intangible product invented by man, so much so that its name carries it, the cloud, is a market that despite being very large continues to expand and has very important upward projections, around $129,000 million dollars in preliminary revenue in 2020.

First, to understand this market we must understand a little of this product, what it offers, what are its differentiators, and above all, why it is becoming so demanded and used by the most important companies in the world.

All that “The Cloud” offers

The basic principle seems to be very simple, storage and management of information in a space apart from computers and servers, in order not to saturate and slow down hardware.

With the appearance of mass-use applications in 2006, changes in information consumption and storage habits led to the cloud being seen as a whole field of possibilities in which to store, manage, generate platforms, develop applications and many other services.

This specialization has evolved to such a degree that the types of clouds found in the market have been divided into at least three general branches:

• SaaS: Software as a Service
• IaaS: Infrastructure as a Service
• PaaS: Platform as a Service

It is worth noting the fact that, although these three are the general branches of the cloud services division, today this range of services has increased to an impressive degree of specialization.

It is thanks to this specialization and diversification that, through the cloud, information is maintained in services as diverse as the following:

• Data analytics and BI.
• Payment platforms.
• Networks and communications.
• Enterprise Resource Management (ERM), Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and omnichannel support.
• Telework management.
• Robotics.
• Tracking and monitoring.
• Electronic signature, digital contracts, and transactions.
• Data storage, search and retrieval, e-mail, and file-as-a-service.

The market

The cloud market is a large and contrasting market, with several companies participating in it, although with only five of pointers and, at the forefront, only two companies have more than 50% of the total market share, Amazon, and Microsoft.

Results at the close of Q4 2020, indicate that there was around $37 billion global enterprise spending on cloud services, and this figure represents a 35% increase over 2019.

It is no small feat to mention that, in year-over-year data, from Q3 2020 to Q4 2020, there was a significant increase of $4 billion quarter-over-quarter.

This market is a dynamic market that, from 2016 to date, has expanded its presence twofold, while maintaining a steady growth of around 30% annually

Although in appearance the participants are still few, and even some of these participants base their functions on the network of other larger participants, according to experts, it is a market that still has a lot of ground to cover, and that is driven by the dizzying needs of countless companies that find it urgent to make the digital conversion of their processes, to streamline their operation and not fall behind in their respective markets.