Cloud Wars Live with Bob Evans

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 Welcome to the Cloud Wars Minute — your daily cloud news and commentary show. Each episode provides insights and perspectives around the “reimagination machine” that is the cloud.In today’s Cloud Wars Minute, I take a closer look at SAP’s Q2 cloud performance—24% revenue growth and a 22% rise in current cloud backlog—slower than past quarters, but still dramatically outpacing rivals like Highlights00:13 — One of the leaders in the Cloud Wars Top 10, SAP, has been the fastest-growing enterprise apps company for several straight quarters, far outperforming all of its competitors, which include Oracle, Workday, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics 365. And they reported recently—SAP did—a very strong Q2. But there were a couple wrinkles in there.01:02 — The cloud revenue was up 24% to $6 billion. But in Q1, the growth rate was 25%, so a slight dip in the growth rate in Q2. Current cloud backlog in Q2 was 22%; that 22% is well down from Q1’s 28%. It expected the backlog growth to moderate through the rest of the year. But this is a pretty big drop. It saw a re-emergence of uncertainty in the market in the second quarter.AI Agent & Copilot Summit is an AI-first event to define opportunities, impact, and outcomes with Microsoft Copilot and agents. Building on its 2025 success, the 2026 event takes place March 17-19 in San Diego. Get more details. 02:08 — He noted in the U.S., in the public sector, the DOGE impact has slowed things down a little. On the flip side, Klein said, Now, we’ve got some mega deals that are out there. He said, I don’t think they’re going to disappear, but they have been postponed . . . There’s a little more rigor in getting approvals for those. But he said, I think that will come through.03:20 — I would also say that at the size that SAP is at now, it’s a $24 billion run rate,r 24% growth is quite good. And this current backlog growth of 22% in itself is also very strong. But a couple of quarters ago, its backlog grew 32%, then 25%, now 22%. So it’s fair to say, is a trend.04:10 — Overall, it is an interesting time now for buyers, I think more broadly, since some of this uncertainty that Klein referred to around tariffs—I think a lot of that uncertainty is going away. We just heard this announcement of the U.S. and Japan in a $550 billion deal. I think this is going to alleviate some of the concern that SAP customers expressed and that Klein referred to. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

In today's Cloud Wars Minute, I explore how Microsoft is helping Thailand modernize its legal system using AI and cloud technologies to support its bid for OECD membership.Highlights00:03 — Microsoft is helping to transform Thailand's legal system using AI and cloud technologies. The company is working closely with the Office of the Council of State. This effort is a critical part of the country's ambition to join the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, or OECD.00:30 — At the heart of this partnership is the TH2OECD initiative, an AI-powered legal comparison platform built on the Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service. This platform automatically translates and analyzes more than 70,000 Thai legislative documents and compares them with over 270 OECD legal instruments.01:06 — It's an interesting use case for AI. Here, it's demonstrating the technology's capabilities in action. And while it's common for companies to implement ambitious analysis and management programs for their internal purposes, doing so at a governmental scale is even more impressive. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

Highlights00:14 — Later today, we will hear from SAP about its Q2 financial results. So the cloud revenue for the past six quarters: 24%, 25%, 27%, 20%, 27%, 27%. I’m projecting 27% for Q2. It's even been stronger in its cloud backlog numbers: 27%, 28%, 29%, up to 32% in the giant Q4 numbers, 28% in Q1. I’m projecting the backlog will go up 29% for Q2.01:34 — Three months ago, after SAP released its Q1 numbers, CEO Christian Klein did an interview with Bloomberg TV, and he said something that I think surprised a lot of people: “There has been absolutely no pullback on U.S. spending.” Now, you might suspect that there would have been—with all this doom and gloom coming up about tariffs.02:44 — A couple of the big factors: SAP has shifted fully to AI. It's embedding it in all iits applications and solutions, in its Joule agent system. It's doing its launch of its Business Data Cloud, which fuels so much of what they’re doing in AI for customers. And also, its very ambitious ecosystem and partnership strategy has been quite strong and continues to be that way.03:37 — We heard recently from Oracle CEO Safra Catz — she feels that Oracle’s applications business is about to kick into higher growth, and she says that it will become the largest cloud applications provider. So, a challenge coming at SAP’s leadership in that field from Oracle.04:10 — I’ve got an article coming up later today with more details on my outlook for SAP. And later this week, we’ll be catching up on its numbers, along with those of IBM, ServiceNow, and others in the Cloud Wars Top 10. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

Oracle, Microsoft, AWS, and Google Cloud. Oracle is the newest member of that elite club and recently claimed that none of the others can match them in the cloud. This is a timely topic, as business leaders accelerate their move into the cloud to harness AI and innovation.01:00 — Recently Oracle Cloud Infrastructure's President Clay Magouyrk stated that Oracle is the only hyperscaler able to deliver more than 200 cloud and AI services across every deployment model. Google Cloud said it's no longer about the number of services or deployment models—it’s about using digital tech to help customers build their futures.02:02 — In the next week or so, I’ll be sharing Google Cloud’s full point of view and how they believe customers should really be evaluating cloud infrastructure providers. It’s a smart and healthy debate—one that gives customers visibility into how these tech giants are evolving. Which are truly keeping up with what customers value most today?02:45 — I give Clay Magouyrk credit for opening this discussion and to Google Cloud for engaging with it meaningfully. I’m leaving the door open for Microsoft and AWS if they’d like to join the conversation. These debates are good for everyone because they help clarify what matters. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

Highlights00:03 — Oracle shares jumped 4% following news that the company is poised to sign a massive cloud deal expected to generate $30 billion annually, starting in fiscal year 2028. It's a potential game-changer for the company's revenue and growth. The announcement of the deal has already been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.00:31 — Oracle's cloud business has received a substantial boost of late. Last year, my colleague Bob Evans highlighted a significant milestone that was Oracle's cloud revenue surpassing its license revenue for the first time. Since then, as per the fiscal year 2025, cloud revenue has surged to $6.7 billion marking a remarkable 27% year over year increase.01:01 — The challenge now will be managing future investments in preparation for such an opportunity in the rapidly evolving technology and business climates. 2028 is still a long way off, and Oracle will need to ramp up operations strategically. I have full confidence in the Catz/Ellison Dream Team's ability to handle it and to handle such a major push for its cloud business. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

closely with the U.K. government, which feels it's got a lot of "ball-and-chain technology" hampering the ability of its employees but also governments themselves to move into the future and deliver greater service to their constituents. It is looking to cut expenses via modern technology by up to $50 billion, and it's enlisted Google Cloud's help to do that.01:25 — At the Imperial War Museum, it's undertaken a project to use AI and cloud technologies to preserve 20,000 hours of oral conversations with 8,000 different individuals who took part in various conflicts from World War II up to the present time.02:16 — The Imperial War Museum's Head of Transformation said: if we were doing this manually, it would take 22 years. He said, with the solution that Google Cloud and Capgemini are proposing, it should take about one month.03:00 — The third customer there is Morrisons supermarkets. So, a new offering from Morrisons that they built with Google Cloud, called "Product Finder"—pretty simple concept—but it helps customers find and get to the products they want and need in stores or online almost instantly.04:06 — But I think each touches on this notion that you could say these address efficiency and productivity issues. But they also, by doing so with modern technology, connect directly to new opportunities—right? You want to excite and delight these customers, so they want to come back. They know they had a good experience. They're going to come back. Spend more. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

In today's Cloud Wars Minute, I explore Amazon’s massive new AI infrastructure project, Project Rainier, built for Anthropic and the largest-ever deployment of Trainium2 chips by Annapurna Labs.Highlights00:03 — AWS is building a colossal supercomputing cluster for Anthropic, a company that has received a total of $8 billion in backing from Amazon. Project Rainier is spread across multiple U.S. sites and uses hundreds of thousands of Annapurna Labs Trainium2 accelerators, and is set to launch later this year. One site alone, in Indiana, will feature 30 200,000-square-foot data centers.00:36 — Gadi Hutt, Director of Product and Customer Engineering at Annapurna Labs, said the following: "This is the first time we're building such a large-scale training cluster that will allow a customer — in this case, Anthropic — to train a single model across all of that infrastructure."01:26 — Now it's in direct competition with OpenAI, the only other company with comparable compute and training capabilities. This marks a major milestone in the escalating AI arms race, and by proxy, could be a big win for Amazon. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

In today's Cloud Wars Minute, I analyze the recent Microsoft layoffs.Highlights00:14 — It's an ugly part of the free-market capitalism world, but what is inevitable in some ways — is layoffs. In the first six months of this year, Microsoft has laid off 15,000 people. I think we need to look at this as part of the new normal. It's an unfortunate consequence of the AI revolution and the incredible benefits and growth that it’s going to drive.01:08 — I think we've seen a lot of people say, “Oh, here it comes, AI is displacing people.” These big companies are going to try to cut costs. They’re trying to reduce expenses. I think here, the focus isn’t on cutting costs, saving money, and dumping people, but rather on: Can we be prepared as quickly as possible for a very, very different future?02:12 — And that’s what this AI revolution is going to bring. I think Nadella is trying very hard here to ensure that they’ve got their entire workforce aligned on growth opportunities for the future and all the changes that the AI revolution is going to bring to Microsoft’s customers, rather than, you know, piddling around with, “How do we save a couple bucks here and there?”03:03 — Every process is ultimately going to be affected by this. It’s going to change how companies think, how they work, how they operate, what their processes are, how they grow, how they make money. Any company that wants to stay in business is going to realign its workforce to match up with those new opportunities. That’s what I believe Microsoft is doing.04:27 — I think we’re going to see that across every industry, every region of the world. One of the outcomes is that we’ll see some people moved around to new opportunities inside companies, but we’re also going to see some people let go because they either don’t have the backgrounds, the mindset, or whatever it might be, to match up with what their businesses need. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

In today's Cloud Wars Minute, I take a look at what the Oracle-AWS collaboration means for the future of multi-cloud innovation and customer value.Highlights00:22 — I think we can say now there’s romance in the cloud. Oracle and AWS are doing things in a collaborative way that they've never done before. The customers are swooning over this cloud romance. This is all built around the Oracle Database@AWS, part of a multi-cloud deal.01:09 — This inclusion now, in addition to the heavy competition, also some collaborative effort is really a big benefit to customers. Just a few of the outcomes for customers of this relationship: they get more choice, they’re able to move on things more quickly, the security is better. They gain greater simplicity in how they do things.02:25 — So the final piece about this is: What are we going to see here? Is this going to lead to a softer, gentler range of competition in the Cloud Wars? Are AWS and Oracle going to be like the lion and the lamb and lie down together and be best friends forever? I don't think so. But what they need to be able to do here is continue to find ways to work together where it's appropriate.03:36 — So, I wish Oracle and AWS all the best. I hope they’re able to balance this new love affair with also a sense that they’re going to continue to brawl frequently and vigorously. That’s good for everybody: them, their customers, and the people who benefit from what those customers do. Visit Cloud Wars for more.