One of the major issues with first-generation cloud cost management platforms is their tendency to become shelfware. Low data quality, high barriers to entry for new users, and low signal-to-noise ratio made it hard to drive cost accountability among engineering teams — and pushed many organizations to nearly give up on it.

Over the last few years, Google Cloud has grown at the fastest rate of any cloud service provider today. From 2020 to 2021, Google Cloud’s IaaS offering, GCP, grew 64%, followed by Microsoft Azure (51%) and Alibaba Cloud (42%), according to Gartner. Yet Google Cloud isn’t flawless. Here’s what we mean and some of the top Google Cloud alternatives you’ll want to consider today.

Although Amazon Web Services (AWS) still holds about a third of the cloud services market, Google Cloud Platform (GCP) has been growing rapidly in recent years. Among the reasons for GCP’s rapid adoption is its simpler pricing structure compared to Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Is that really the case? And how do AWS and GCP pricing differ? But first, a quick background.

In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, Kubernetes has emerged as the go-to orchestration platform, revolutionizing the way applications are deployed, scaled, and managed in containerized environments. As organizations increasingly adopt Kubernetes, with platforms like Amazon’s Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) leading the charge, the importance of cost management within these environments has come to the forefront.

I GOT MENTIONED BY AMAZON’S CTO!!!!! Sorry. Just had to get that out of the way. Another year, another pilgrimage to Sin City to rub shoulders with the architects of Amazon, to talk shop with the world’s leading software companies, and to hear the latest announcements from all the wave-makers on the expo floor. It’s also an opportunity for the cloud industry, now endowed with the very serious task of keeping much of our economy humming, to live a little.

Containers are a big deal today. Because containers are software units that contain all the code, runtime, and dependencies required to run a distributed application, they help engineers test and run apps on any device and platform without compatibility issues. Organizations can use containers to reduce engineering costs, speed up deployments, develop and test AI models, and automate more processes. You probably want those benefits as well.

Cloud migration is the new gold rush, judging from the results of a survey involving 1,283 IT professionals. The survey shows that 88% of companies already use the cloud for some applications and data. Another 80% said they will have moved to cloud and co-location services by 2025. While 87% of respondents said the pandemic accelerated their cloud migration strategy, many companies’ transition plans had been in the works for years.

This holiday season, AWS made waves by dropping a bombshell announcement: “AWS does not permit the sale of reserved instances (RIs) obtained through a discount program (per AWS Service Terms 5.5).” In other words, AWS is banning the resale of discounted RIs in their RI Marketplace. (See the full policy here, section 5.5.) The ban officially goes into effect on January 1, 2024.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers a plethora of cloud-based services that cater to various needs, from computing power and storage to machine learning and analytics. As organizations scale their cloud infrastructure, managing multiple accounts and services can become increasingly complex. This is where AWS Organizations comes into play.

VMware’s CloudHealth and Flexera market themselves as two of the best cloud management platforms today. For organizations with on-premises, cloud, and SaaS operations, both offer a wide range of enterprise-level tools and capabilities. Additionally, both companies offer cloud security, compliance, and governance solutions. Yet, each cloud governance platform has its strengths. Each has its tradeoffs. So, before you choose Flexera or CloudHealth, here’s what you need to know.