Infra
The 20 Coolest Cloud Infrastructure Companies Of The 2024 Cloud 100
Here are the 20 most important and influential cloud infrastructure companies of 2024—from AWS and Microsoft to Dell and Broadcom—that are innovating in the market this year.
The 20 Cloud Infrastructure Market Leaders Of 2024
The 20 cloud infrastructure companies paving the digital road of the future include cloud giants like Amazon Web Services and Microsoft, hardware standouts such as Dell Technologies and Hewlett Packard Enterprise, data center providers like Equinix and Digital Realty, as well as software leaders like Oracle and Broadcom by VMware.
As part of CRN’s 2024 Cloud 100, we searched and reviewed the market to find the 20 companies that are shaking up the red-hot and always-growing cloud infrastructure market in 2024.
These companies provide the server, storage, networking, data, security and computing offerings that power the majority of cloud infrastructure across the globe today.
[Related: AWS, Microsoft, Google Lead Gartner’s Cloud Services Magic Quadrant]
Looking just at the cloud infrastructure services market, worldwide spending is currently on a $272 billion run rate, according to data from IT research firm Synergy Research Group. Worldwide enterprise cloud infrastructure services spending surpassed $68 billion in third-quarter 2023, representing an 18 percent growth rate year over year.
Meanwhile, IT market research firm Gartner expects worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services alone with hit $679 billion in 2024, up from $564 billion in 2023.
By 2027, Gartner also expected that more than 70 percent of all enterprises will use cloud platforms to accelerate their business initiatives, up from less than 15 percent today. “Cloud has become essentially indispensable,” said Gartner’s Sid Nag, vice president Analyst, in a statement.
The various cloud platforms and service offers businesses are buying are all powered by cloud infrastructure, typically housed within large hyperscale data centers.
Here are the 20 hottest cloud infrastructure companies of 2024.
Amazon Web Services
Adam Selipsky
CEO
Amazon Web Services is the global cloud market-share leader with approximately 32 percent share. AWS invests billions each year to expand its cloud infrastructure footprint in the U.S. and overseas with currently over 100 data centers hosting its popular cloud offerings as total cloud sales now exceed $92 billion.
Cisco Systems
Chuck Robbins
Chair, CEO
The world’s largest networking company powers and connects countless amounts of cloud infrastructure across the globe. Cisco also builds an ever-growing portfolio of cloud software to boost its networking, application management and cybersecurity offerings. Cisco recently acquired multi-cloud networking startup Isovalent.
Dell Technologies
Michael Dell
Founder, Chairman, CEO
Dell Technologies is the world’s largest provider of servers and storage hardware that power cloud infrastructure. Dell has been investing significantly over the past several years in providing cloud Infrastructure as a Service via its Apex portfolio, which includes Apex Cloud Services and Custom Solutions for multi-cloud control.
DigitalOcean
Paddy Srinivasan
CEO
DigitalOcean provides offerings targeting the startup and SMB markets. The cloud infrastructure provider helps customers rapidly build, deploy and scale, whether creating a digital presence or building digital products. DigitalOcean combines simplicity, security and support so customers can spend less time managing their infrastructure and more time building applications.
Digital Realty
William Stein
CEO
Digital Realty is one of the largest global providers of cloud data centers and colocation facilities that house cloud infrastructure. Digital Realty is building hyperscale data centers for cloud computing, recently unveiling plans to build four hyperscale campuses in Paris, Frankfurt and in Northern Virginia for $7 billion.
Equinix
Charles Meyers
President, CEO
Equinix dubs itself as the largest global data center and colocation provider for enterprise networking and cloud computing. The company has a gigantic footprint of over 250 data centers in more than 70 regions around the world along with over 10,000 customers, including more than half of the Fortune 500 companies.
Flexential
Chris Downie
CEO
Flexential offers a top-notch suite of customized offerings including integrated colocation, interconnection, data protection and cloud services via its cloud infrastructure. The company’s Flexential FlexAnywhere Platform delivers tailored cloud infrastructure with automation in a pay-as-you-go model that is scalable and flexible for each customer’s needs.
Google Cloud
Thomas Kurian
CEO
Google Cloud is the world’s third largest cloud computing company, currently owning 11 percent share of the global cloud market. Google continues to annually pour billions into growing its cloud infrastructure, including recently building new cloud regions and infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Germany.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
Antonio Neri
President, CEO
HPE is one of the world’s largest cloud infrastructure providers with a huge portfolio of storage, servers and networking hardware. The company’s GreenLake edge-to-cloud platform provides cloud and Infrastructure-as-a-Service solutions regardless of where applications and data live—from public clouds and colocation to private data centers.
IBM
Arvind Krishna
Chairman, CEO
The IBM Cloud with Red Hat offers scalability, security and open-source technology aimed at unlocking the full potential of the cloud. IBM has dozens of cloud regions with data centers full of cloud infrastructure. The company currently owns 3 percent of the global cloud infrastructure services market.
Lenovo
Yuanqing Yang
Chairman, CEO
The hardware giant is a global provider of servers, storage and networking hardware for cloud infrastructure. Lenovo’s TruScale Infrastructure Services offers Infrastructure as a Service in a cloud-like experience with on-premises security and control. Lenovo’s metering and utilization technology helps customers benefit from real-time cost insight.
Lumen Technologies
Kate Johnson
President, CEO
Alongside its networking, collaboration and security products, Lumen Technologies specializes in cloud infrastructure for the anywhere edge. Lumen’s edge cloud platform is a fully integrated stack of compute, cloud, storage, networking, security, CDN and orchestrion that can scale up resources to the capacity, latency and processing power needed.
Microsoft
Satya Nadella
Chairman, CEO
The world’s second largest cloud computing company currently owns 23 percent share of the massive global cloud computing market. Microsoft has one of the largest cloud infrastructure portfolios in the market and is constantly growing its reach with now over 200 Azure data centers across more than 60 regions worldwide.
Nutanix
Rajiv Ramaswami
President, CEO
Nutanix is a hyperconverged software market leader that powers thousands of businesses’ cloud infrastructure across the globe. Nutanix’s AHV software aims to lower cost and improve availability of cloud infrastructure, with the capability to scale and bridge to public clouds.
Oracle
Safra Catz
CEO
Oracle is a software superstar that provides an automated platform for migrating workloads and building new cloud-native applications. The company dubs its Oracle Cloud Infrastructure as a next-generation cloud designed to run any application faster and more securely for the best price point.
Red Hat
Matt Hicks
President, CEO
With OpenShift as the foundation, Red Hat Cloud Services offers a scalable cloud platform that provides enterprise-grade security and compliance, as well as proactive support and monitoring. The open-source star provides software and services to various cloud infrastructure provides including IBM, AWS and Microsoft.
Scale Computing
Jeff Ready
Founder, CEO
Scale Computing’s HCI Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure delivers high availability and scalability for running applications in data centers. The company’s platform combines storage, servers, hypervisor, backup and disaster recovery into a single appliance. Scale Computing aims to create more affordable and scalable cloud infrastructure.
TierPoint
Jerry Kent
Chairman, CEO
With over 40 data centers across America, TierPoint is a national provider of private, public and multitenant cloud infrastructure. The company takes an agnostic approach to cloud computing, dubbing itself as a champion for untangling the complexity of hybrid and multi-cloud infrastructure thanks to its cloud expertise around colocation, disaster recovery and public cloud.
Vast Data
Renen Hallak
CEO
The Vast Data Platform combines storage, database and containerization into a single software platform that powers cloud infrastructure. The data platform provider startup is one of the fastest-growing infrastructure companies in the world. In late 2023, Vast Data secured $118 million in a Series E funding round.
VMware by Broadcom
Hock Tan
President, CEO
Broadcom’s blockbuster $61 billion acquisition of VMware sent shockwaves through the IT world in 2023. VMware by Broadcom will continue to offer VMware cloud infrastructure and management products, including VMware Cloud Foundation and its Hybrid Cloud services, as well as some flagship solutions like vSphere, NSX and vSAN that will be bundled together.