6. Rick Villars, IDC

The competition is stiff, but it appears Microsoft Azure has edged out Amazon Web Services, according to new public cloud numbers from IDC. And Azure hasn’t only placed No. 1 with IDC. Flexera also put the cloud provider in its top spot. 

IDC’s Rick Villars made waves assessing the future implications of these providers.

“For the next several years, leading cloud providers will play a critical role in helping enterprises navigate the current storms of disruption – inflation, supply chain and geopolitical tensions – but IT teams will also focus more on bringing greater financial accountability to the variable spend models of public cloud services,” Villars said.

Get more information about the IDC report here.