Target would have followed the leadership of Walmart and plans to transfer its business to Amazon Web Services. A massive outflow of AWS retailers would benefit competitors such as Google Cloud Platform (Microsoft Cloud (MSFT - Get Report) and Google Cloud Platform (GOOGL - Get Report)). The Amazon cloud trade is so large that it could withstand losses, however. Microsoft, Google and other major cloud players have their own potential conflicts that could cost them business.
Although Target did not speak directly to Amazon Web Services, the company said it used several cloud service providers. "Earlier this year we evaluated suppliers, as we do on a regular basis, and we have determined that there are options that are more appropriate for our business," a spokesman said. "We have decided to implement changes and we have made changes since then."
Similarly, Amazon declined to comment. While the digital commerce giant may have friction with Walmart and Target, Amazon Web Services still has retail customers such as Brooks Brothers Group Inc., GameStop Corp. (GNE - Get Report) and Nordstrom Inc. (JWN - Get Report) and AWS are also using Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU - Get Report), Nike Inc. (NKE - Get Report) and Under Armor Inc..
"While AWS remains the 800-pound gorilla in the public cloud market, we believe that its parent's ambitions can begin to have a greater impact on AWS's ability to move to some vertical markets," said Everkite ISI, analyst "Combine it with the growing momentum behind hybrid cloud architectures and we believe that Azure remains well positioned to gain market share in the next few years as it will be considered a reliable partner and capabilities Azure technologies are essentially on a par with AWS in many areas now (if not in some). "
Although the loss of a large account is undeniably bad, John Dinsdale of Synergy Research Group said in an e-mail that Wal-Mart and Target's defections would be "cutbacks" rather than "big events" for Amazon.
