Amazon.com Inc will drop prices on most of its cloud computing services starting April 1, the largest U.S. online retailer said on Wednesday, a day after rival Google Inc outlined a major price cut of its own.<\/p>\n
The price cuts range from 10 percent to 65 percent, Andrew Jassy, senior vice president of Amazon Web Services, told a conference for Amazon web developers in San Francisco.<\/p>\n
This marks the 42nd price reduction for AWS since its introduction eight years ago. In a separate press release on Wednesday, the company said the U.S. Department of Defense deemed Amazon’s cloud computing service secure enough to be used more broadly within the department.<\/p>\n
AWS provides the underlying infrastructure for popular Web companies such as online movie streaming service Netflix Inc and social network Pinterest.<\/p>\n
Cloud services have become increasingly popular among both cash-strapped tech startups and larger companies, which rely on computers owned and operated by the likes of Amazon and Google, the world’s No. 1 Internet search engine, instead of buying the equipment themselves.<\/p>\n
Amazon, which pioneered public cloud computing in 2006, remains a dominant force in the industry. Its fast-growing AWS business helped transform the company from traditional online retailing into a tech industry giant, and is often cited by investors as a major pillar of its future growth.<\/p>\n
But others are making inroads. Earlier this week, Cisco Systems Inc announced plans to spend $1 billion over the next two years to build a new cloud services business.<\/p>\n
AWS has five times the computing power of its 14 rivals combined, Jassy said during his keynote address, citing an analysis that industry consultancy Gartner published last August.<\/p>\n
“When you look at all those capabilities, they don’t exist anywhere else,” Jassy said.<\/p>\n
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