The clouds part, cash rains on Microsoft's UK money-making machine

Microsoft's board of directors declared a quarterly dividend of $0.51 per share this week as its UK tentacle reported another bonzer year of revenue growth. The dividend will be payable on 10 September and matches that paid in the previous two quarters. The trillion-dollar company has continued to enjoy a rise in stock price …

[Anonymous Coward]

I guarantee that over-reliance on the cloud will cause more companies to fail than anything that Covid or Brexit has managed.

[Steve Davies 3]

Not only Azure

Mind you, the same risk applies to all those who use Google Docs and a host of other services on other cloud services including AWS.

Companies that trade online (and who does not these days) need to make sure that their contracts for their storefront uptime is ironclad in their favour. It won't be much good if you go bust because your storefront went 'phut' and the provider says 'tough'.

[Roland6]

Re: Not only Azure

Need also to make sure your busines continuity plans are uptodate (and realisable under lockdown conditions); it is not unknown for cloud service providers to either go offline or go 'phut' themselves...

[Anonymous Coward]

That was a reasonable thing to say a decade ago. Cloud computing has proved itself more reliable and lower cost than on prem solutions and if you’re still clinging on to that then your days may be numbered. It’s only a matter of time before someone with current skills comes along and transforms the business around you. Cloud and digitalisation are here to stay and accelerating in adoption. I’ve seen zero companies fail due to cloud.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've seen several projects fail in the cloud.. although that's partly due to the tech changes that went with it.

I have to say though, that we've consistently found that on-prem is cheaper than the cloud. Our reliability has been a bit better too.

I'm not saying the cloud hasn't got it's place but most companies aren't Amazon/Google and don't need to work like them. In fact it's expensive and overly complex to do so.

[johnnyblaze]

I disagree. Companies are being hoovered up into the cloud often because they have no choice and orgs (like Microsoft) make it very difficult to stay out of it. The cloud exists for one reason - continuous revenue for the cloud providers. It often doesn't make things easier or quicker, and I stand by the belief that very few companies save money moving to the cloud - it often costs more - a lot more.

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree that it's not cheaper if your skillset is on-prem. If you take the time to learn how to use Cloud as it's intended then it can be considerably cheaper. I've seen solutions which were specced over £1M on prem turn out to be £3 per month in the cloud. Yes that is £3 and I didn't miss a letter.

People who fight for the status quo generally achieve a status quo, so your experience in this matter is what you've made it.