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Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

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Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#61

Post by wiremine »

awakeasleep wrote: post #36
wiremine wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to be Netflix to get AWS, GCP and MS to play against each on pricing. I've seen a number of my clients build a prototype on each platforms, and then use it to make final decision. Part of that final decision is having the cloud vendors compete on price. I personally haven't seen any massive price breaks, but there definitely is room the margins.

Really playing these companies against each other would mean dynamically balancing your services across the providers based on pricing

I've love to see some open source tools that manage this automagically for me. :-)

It would also require an architecture that supports multiple interfaces. Totally doable (the facade pattern comes to mind) but you'd want to calculate the TCO to see it works out financially.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#62

Post by sitkack »

nandhp wrote: post #58
Twirrim wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For years Dell would let it "leak" out to the press that they were looking at supporting AMD chips. It would happen every year like clockwork. Then after a month you'd hear that Dell and Intel had come up with a new deal to remain Intel exclusive.

Hasn't Dell offered AMD chips for a long time? Dell currently sells AMD-based laptops, and was doing so back in 2008 as well. For example, this Ryzen laptop: http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/new-inspiron-15-...

These are probably to prevent action from the FTC.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#63

Post by ggg9990 »

nandhp wrote: post #58
Twirrim wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For years Dell would let it "leak" out to the press that they were looking at supporting AMD chips. It would happen every year like clockwork. Then after a month you'd hear that Dell and Intel had come up with a new deal to remain Intel exclusive.

Hasn't Dell offered AMD chips for a long time? Dell currently sells AMD-based laptops, and was doing so back in 2008 as well. For example, this Ryzen laptop: http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/new-inspiron-15-...

I think they are talking about when Dell made serious profits in PCs.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#64

Post by hinkley »

falcolas wrote: post #53
ryanianian wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They'll play a few games with contracts to spread the costs around (e.g. giving n% discounts for m years of reserved capacity). You probably won't get much just by saying "I can just go to GCP" and asking for the world. The more you spend, the more distinct services you buy, and the longer you want to commit the steeper the discount. I've seen up to 10% but I'm sure they do more for bigger customers.

I've seen upwards of 50% for some particularly large customers. To the point of "if we lose our discount, our company goes under".

Makes you wonder if the vendor is still making money on the deal.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#65

Post by maxxxxx »

falcolas wrote: post #41

This could also be titled "Netflix Ensures its AWS Discounts Continue" AWS sales teams are quite responsive to threats of moving in terms of continuing discounts. I've drawn up migration plans solely to use as leverage against AWS for deep discounts in the past.

Just curious: Can you state a range of possible discounts against list price? The stuff I deal with is small fry but I always wonder how much cheaper the big guys get their cloud services compared to us.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#66

Post by dalyons »

archgoon wrote: post #31
KirinDave wrote: post #25

Firstly: not very new. Hasn't Netflix been at this for a long time? Secondly, everyone should be checking. Not only is Google doing a lot of subsidization, but their services are really really good. My current employer ended up being unable to use them but it's I acutely regret every day I'm forced to build out things Google already has or deal with Amazon's frustratingly antiquated ELB infrastructure.

What are the problems you've been running into with ELB?

No http2 support is increasingly limiting

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#67

Post by Cshelton »

KirinDave wrote: post #25

Firstly: not very new. Hasn't Netflix been at this for a long time? Secondly, everyone should be checking. Not only is Google doing a lot of subsidization, but their services are really really good. My current employer ended up being unable to use them but it's I acutely regret every day I'm forced to build out things Google already has or deal with Amazon's frustratingly antiquated ELB infrastructure.

AWS's ELB/ALB have been rock solid for us. Not sure what you are referring to when you say 'antiquated infrastructure'?

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#68

Post by andyfleming »

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #60

My prediction is that by 2020 Netflix will move a significant portion of their IT to Google Cloud. Why? Most of their architecture is microservices / linux containers / serverless, and Google is simply way better positioned there (with Kubernetes as their crown jewel). They will eventually win. Source: no source, just my "expert" opinion (6 years at AWS, 2 at VMware's cloud, currently CEO at a startup).

AWS is catching up as far as Kubernetes support. I might agree that GCP is better positioned for some of that architecture, but they are still comparable. There are also some advantages to AWS. For example, I think that their RDS product is still more mature than Google Cloud SQL.

It's all trade-offs.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#69

Post by curun1r »

assblaster wrote: post #6

I think long term, Netflix needs redundancy, especially when the primary supplier is a competitor in the same space.

Perhaps long term, that would be an issue. But short term and even medium term, I don't see Netflix, Prime Video and YouTube Red as competition. Their real competition is cable/satellite and as long as Netflix helps round out a cord-cutting bundle that convinces people to ditch cable, it's a net benefit to Google/Amazon. And as cable dies, especially given the recent FCC direction, you can expect them to start to play more games with the internet connections they also provide to customers. I think Google and Amazon realize that Netflix will be much more sympathetic in that fight than either of them will be. So it makes sense for Amazon/Google to support Netflix as much as possible so they can use them as a proxy in the upcoming fight against the cable companies.

Re: Netflix, Long an AWS Customer, Tests Waters on Google Cloud

#70

Post by hinkley »

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #60

My prediction is that by 2020 Netflix will move a significant portion of their IT to Google Cloud. Why? Most of their architecture is microservices / linux containers / serverless, and Google is simply way better positioned there (with Kubernetes as their crown jewel). They will eventually win. Source: no source, just my "expert" opinion (6 years at AWS, 2 at VMware's cloud, currently CEO at a startup).

How big doesn’t netflix have to get before it’s in their best interests to build data centers of their own?

Toolchains are maturing. They’ve figured out ways to get multiple uses from the same hardware. They shouldn’t be beholden to the rollout or geographical plans of two cloud providers.

I don’t even mean build out their entire infrastructure. I think even running your base load on your own hardware makes you understand your cloud situation much more profoundly.

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