The next step in app modernization: Is AWS domination a foregone conclusion?

I’ve written frequently about app modernization on this blog, as it’s the type of project that my company frequently does for clients. While there are a variety of technologies and platforms that clients build their modernizations on, mostly dependent on their existing technologies and specific needs, Amazon Web Services (AWS) has become a dominant force in the space.

I recently read an AWS white paper on modernizing Microsoft applications that referenced research suggesting that “50 percent of respondents were using AWS to support productivity applications like those from Microsoft.” Furthermore, “65 percent said they planned to increase their use of AWS either to move existing applications or to expand applications already running on AWS.”

What’s most interesting to me isn’t that companies are modernizing their applications at this rate (because that’s what we’ve seen in our customers as well) but rather that AWS is making a clear play to position as the best option for companies modernizing from Microsoft applications built on traditional on-premises infrastructure.

In my opinion, this signals the increasing growth and dominance of AWS, but is that such a bad thing? There will always be people who say that over-reliance on any given technology is dangerous, because it discourages competition and potentially opens your organization up to the risk that your technology of choice will go under or become obsolete.

While that may be the case with emerging start-ups or technologies, I think it’s safe to say that AWS isn’t going anywhere. If Amazon’s system (which was developed by Amazon through both a build and buy strategy that, of course, rendered “obsolete” the technologies that were acquired to create the behemoth) is truly the best in the space, particularly when it comes to working with popular technology suites like Microsoft, why shouldn’t it expand in response to growing demand? Microsoft itself is in the same position today, for the very same reason.

We’ll continue to customize our modernization projects to best meet the needs of our individual clients, but AWS is definitely on our radar and — from the looks of it — won’t be going away anytime soon.