Dive Brief:
- Boeing and Microsoft announced Monday plans to work together to build a cloud-based platform for Boeing's commercial aviation analytics tools, according to an announcement.
- Once built, the companies intend to work together to transition many of Boeing's commercial aviation applications to Microsoft Azure.
- Boeing’s aviation analytics applications are used by more than 300 airlines to predict maintenance needs and optimize fuel consumption.
Dive Insight:
Boeing had previously used both Amazon and CenturyLink cloud platforms, but Kevin Crowley, Boeing vice president of digital aviation, told the Wall Street Journal that using a variety of cloud systems "threatened to strain Boeing’s cloud-computing expertise."
"It just became apparent that we needed to centralize around one (cloud) technology," said Crowley.
Businesses are likely to select more than one public cloud provider to meet their various business needs, according to a May survey from Cowen & Co. But with a skill set demand for cloud engineers, leveraging multiple cloud solutions can in some instances outpace a companies' abilities.
Microsoft has been fighting to make a dent in Amazon Web Services’ vast lead in the cloud market. According to a May report from Synergy Research, AWS currently has 31% market share, while Microsoft, IBM and Google together share just 22% of the cloud market.
Microsoft is moving its focus toward industry business lately. Last week, GE and Microsoft announced plans to partner on a number of efforts to help industrial businesses digitally transform by leveraging IoT data with Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform. One of the first steps in the collaboration will make GE’s Predix platform for the Industrial Internet available on the Azure cloud.
