May 23, 2018 at 12:54PM
via Business Insider

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• Amazon Web Services and Microsoft's Azure are the top two players in cloud computing and are likely to remain so, a new report indicates.
• IT decision makers surveyed for the report say they're more familiar with both services than their rivals, and that customers are more likely to ramp up their spending with Amazon or Microsoft.
• Cowen, which issued the report, pointed to it in upping its price targets for both Microsoft and Amazon on Wednesday.

When it comes to the cloud-computing market, Amazon is the clear leader and Microsoft's a strong No. 2.

Their dominance of the space isn't going to change anytime soon, if new research from Cowen is any indication. Companies of all kinds — small, medium, and large — are rushing to embrace the cloud. But customers of Amazon Web Services and Microsoft's Azure are more likely than those of other services to ramp up their spending this year, Cowen found.

"AWS and Azure scored well across the board" in the survey, the Cowen analysts said in a report issued Wednesday. "Both companies continue to distance themselves from the rest of the pack."

Indeed, the analysts cited the survey results in raising their price targets on both companies. Cowen now has a price target of $2,000 a share for Amazon, up from $1,900 a share, and $112 a share for Microsoft, up from $105 a share.

In recent trading on Wednesday, Amazon's stock was at $1,584.36 a share, while Microsoft was trading at $97.56.

Thomson ReutersFor its survey, Cowen polled some 574 IT decision makers at a collection of small, mid-size, and enterprise companies about their current and expected use of cloud services. In general, the respondents who were customers of AWS or Azure were more enthusiastic about those services than their rivals, although on some questions, all the major service providers scored well.

Customers of AWS and Azure are ramping up their spending

On average, for example, the decision makers plan to increase their spending across all cloud providers by about 28% this year. But customers of AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Oracle Cloud, and IBM Cloud each plan to up their spending with those services by at least 31% on average, according to the survey, with Amazon's service topping the list at 32%.

Perhaps more tellingly, customers of AWS and Azure were more likely than those of other services to say that the rate of growth in their cloud spending will increase this year. On average, about 28% of respondents said they planned to accelerate their cloud spending in general this year.

But 41% of AWS and Azure customers said they plan to increase the growth rate in their spending with those services this year. Another 42% of customers of both services said they plan to keep the rate of growth in their spending with them about the same.

"We currently forecast market leaders AWS and Azure to grow well above expected market growth in 2018," the Cowen analysts said in the report.

Another good sign for Amazon and Microsoft was that the decision makers in general were much more likely to be aware of AWS and Azure than other cloud services. About 67% of respondents were familiar with Azure and 65% with AWS. By contrast, Google Cloud and IBM Cloud were tied for third place with 50%.

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