Cloud computing glossary
The terms used on this site, defined the way the site uses them.
Terms
- Cloud computing
- Renting computing resources such as servers, storage, databases and software over the internet, and paying by use or by subscription instead of buying the hardware.
- Infrastructure as a service (IaaS)
- The basic layer of cloud computing: virtual machines, storage and networking that customers configure themselves. Amazon EC2 and Azure Virtual Machines are examples.
- Platform as a service (PaaS)
- Managed services that run on top of infrastructure, such as databases, container platforms and serverless functions. The provider operates them and the customer brings code and data.
- Software as a service (SaaS)
- Finished applications delivered over the internet, such as email or a CRM. Companies that only sell SaaS are outside the scope of this ranking.
- Hyperscaler
- A cloud provider that operates data centers at very large scale across many regions. The term usually refers to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.
- Neocloud
- A newer kind of cloud provider built mainly to rent GPU capacity for AI training and inference. CoreWeave, Nebius, Lambda and Crusoe are commonly given this label.
- GPU cloud
- Cloud capacity based on graphics processing units, the chips used to train and run AI models. Hyperscalers and neoclouds both sell it.
- One provider’s portion of all spending in a market for a period. Cloud market share figures are analyst estimates, so they differ between research firms.
- Year-over-year growth
- The change in a figure compared with the same period one year earlier. A quarter with 40% growth brought in 1.4 times the revenue of the same quarter a year before.
- Like-for-like growth
- Growth adjusted to remove the effect of currency moves and of businesses bought or sold. OVHcloud reports it next to its reported growth.
- Remaining performance obligations (RPO)
- Revenue a company has under contract but has not yet recognized. Oracle reports it for the whole company.
- Backlog
- Signed customer commitments that have not yet turned into revenue. Companies define it in slightly different ways, so backlogs are not directly comparable.
- Annual run-rate revenue (ARR)
- A recent period’s revenue scaled to a full year. Each company defines the period it uses, so check the definition before comparing two ARR figures.
- Fiscal quarter
- A three-month reporting period in a company’s own financial year. Oracle’s and OVHcloud’s quarters end in August, November, February and May, not at the end of calendar quarters.