There are many factor to take into account, so here is a quick overview of the research I did for the company I currently work for.
The first step I took was to look for as much cloud providers as I could find (I was really surprised with the number of companies that provides cloud services).
From there, I selected the top three. If you are a little informed about this area the results is pretty obvious for you. The top three are: Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform.
"Everybody knows that those are the top 3! Wouldn´t be smarter to skip the first step?"
NO!
First, it doesn´t hurt to double-check. Second, this area is in constant change, even though AWS has been the leader for a very long time, AWS competitors are constantly investing and innovating, so it is always good to work with updated information.
(In my opinion, the best source of information regarding IT solutions and services is Gartner Peer Insights)
Next, I did the following rating for each provider:
- Customer review rating.
- Location of data centers
- Cost of support (This item can vary wildly and it must be discussed internally with your team to find the optimal support package for your needs).
- How friendly the services is with the tools our company already uses.
- Expertise of our team.
We decided for AWS since it is the best rated among users, cost of support is attractive, it is easy to integrate with our current tools, and our team has experience with it.
Microsoft Azure does have better location of data centers to us, but it is not worth to use it considering the facts mentioned above.
Thank you for reading!
