Microsoft scored a razor-thin victory over larger rival Amazon Web Services (AWS) in Forrester Research’s latest ranking of public cloud providers in North America. However, AWS can wipe away those tears with the billions of dollars of additional revenue it generates compared to its smaller rival.

The report, which Forrester admitted did not include all vendors across the sector, lauded Microsoft’s Azure platform for its attention to service packaging. This includes its ability to provide direct access to developer platforms, database services, DevOps tools, a distributed infrastructure, support for hybrid-cloud deployments, and security.

“Its highly secure government cloud regions helped Microsoft secure a multi-billion contract with the U.S. Department of Defense,” the report added. That contract win was a big victory for Microsoft over AWS, though it has since run into a legal challenge.

The report did ding Microsoft for having “good, but not great” artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), mobile and web user interface services. And noted that “some report difficulties navigating Microsoft’s large and complex sales and support organization.”

Despite those deficiencies, the report found that “Microsoft is best for global enterprises and [application development and delivery] pros seeking a distinctive, full-featured, and innovative public cloud platform.”

While just nipped in the ranking, AWS “still sets the bar as the cloud ‘everything store’ for enterprise builders,” the report frankly stated. AWS was cited as having a strong position in just about every category, with the capper being that it generates twice the revenue of its closest rival. That was seconded by a recent report from Synergy Research Group that had AWS maintaining a dominant worldwide position in the space, though Microsoft was beginning to make inroads.

Despite doing just about everything well, Forrester did note that AWS was deficient in its low-code offerings and its mobile development services. “Reference customers give AWS high ratings for its developer experience and development services yet complain that new services lack key features and integrations with others at initial launch,” the report added.

Overall, Forrester found that “AWS is best for enterprises that have prioritized public cloud and cloud-native development services to power digital transformation at massive scale.”

Google was the only other provider in the report to score a place in the “leaders” category. It was cited for aggressively targeting the cloud-native space and its global expansion plans. The report also noted that it has “crafted a compelling strategy for enterprises after a rocky start and is now a viable alternative to AWS and Microsoft for companies using AI/ML, analytics, containers, or functions to build new apps and modernize legacy ones.”

But, Google was also prompted to update some of its workload-specific development experiences, mobile and web UI services, its IoT work, and community strategy. “Google is best for customers who prioritize leading-edge AI/ML services and microservices/containers development and those seeking (or under pressure) to add a second or third major public cloud to a multicloud strategy,” the report found.

Google's management is quite aware of its place in the public-cloud hierarchy and has reportedly put pressure on its cloud operations to improve its market position by 2023.

IBM and Oracle occupied the report’s “strong performers” category.

The former was applauded for aggressively targeting the cloud-native Kubernetes space through its $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat and focus on hybrid- and multicloud deployments. And while it might lack some of the in-depth tools sported by those higher on the list, IBM was cited as being a good pick for enterprises that have a lot of legacy equipment to deal with.

Oracle picked up points for its focus on helping enterprises migrate their operations to the public cloud and hope for its nascent Gen2 infrastructure services. But it lost points for not differentiating itself from the market leaders and was noted as having lost momentum compared with previous Forrester rankings.

Alibaba was the only other public cloud providers included in the ranking and scored a seat on the “contenders” bench. The China-based cloud provider was noted for “an impressive innovation pace” but still struggled with its North American presence. “The vendor’s two regions in the U.S. aren’t enough of a footprint to attract large U.S. enterprises planning for large-scale migrations of infrastructure, though Alibaba remains a strong choice for U.S. companies expanding via cloud platforms into Asia,” the report stated.