Microsoft Claims to Put the Squeeze on Amazon Web Services

If a Microsoft (MSFT) executive is to believed, then the executives over at Amazon Web Services (AWS) are worrying big time. As Redmond Channel Partner reported last week, Microsoft’s Mark Russinovich said at the TechMentor Conference that Amazon is “struggling in the face of pricing pressure” from Microsoft and Google (GOOG).

Russinovich, a technical fellow in Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise Division, was quoted as saying that people are realizing that Microsoft is in the cloud space to win, and recent research shows that Microsoft has made incredible gains on its biggest competitor.

Redmond Magazine also reported on Russinovich’s keynote speech, noting that Russinovich said Microsoft is putting the squeeze on Amazon. And one of the things Russinovich indicated as a strength that is helping Microsoft to win more business is Azure Active Directory and its role in supporting hybrid clouds.

Russinovich also discussed Microsoft’s cloud security strengths, in particular its role-based access control currently in preview. It’s another element of its cloud strategy Microsoft is hoping will push it into an even stronger leadership position in which it could one day challenge Amazon for the top spot.

But don’t start counting Amazon’s days just yet. Microsoft Azure has made incredible strides in the IaaS arena, but Amazon is still growing. Although its growth may have slowed (or not; Amazon doesn’t exactly break out its revenue by business category), Amazon is still growing, and it has quite the distance between its No. 1 position and the trailing position currently held by Microsoft.

With Microsoft’s direction focused on cloud and mobile, it’s clear the company is in cloud for the long haul. How much it will gain on its biggest competitor is unknown, but Microsoft executives seem to expect the company will continue to grow its cloud business and continue to capture market share.