UK Digital Regulator Recommends Competition Watchdog To Inspect Amazon, Microsoft's Duopoly In UK Cloud Market

At the halfway point of its probe into U.K. cloud services, U.K. digital regulator Ofcom decides to refer the market to the Competition and Markets Authority for further investigation after discovering objectionable practices by the influential cloud service providers.
Ofcom flagged Amazon.Com Inc AMZN and Microsoft Corp's MSFT practices for exploiting their market position to make it more difficult for customers to switch and use multiple cloud suppliers.
Ofcom found that Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft have a combined market share of 60-70% in the U.K. Alphabet Inc GOOG GOOGL Google is their closest competitor with a share of 5-10%. Collectively these firms are known as the 'hyperscalers,' and the vast majority of cloud customers use their services in some form.
Also Read: Google Flags Microsoft's Cloud Practices As Anti-Competitive
Ofcom flagged the exorbitant egress fees, technical restrictions on interoperability, and committed spend discounts by the influential service providers to stifle competition for smaller cloud providers.
The regulator proposes to publish a final report on its findings and recommendations, including its decision on a market investigation, by 5 October 2023.
It suggested referring the cloud infrastructure market to the CMA to carry out a market investigation to examine the nature and extent of barriers further and consider if there are interventions that could improve how the market works for customers and, ultimately U.K. consumers.
Photo by Rainer Stropek via Flickr