For 2013, worldwide public cloud services revenue reached a total of US$45.7 billion and IDC expects this market to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23% through 2018, according to the IDC research group (www.idc.com).

"Data provides the edge to companies that can leverage their information for competitive advantage, through new products and services or an enriched customer experience. Software for data management, data access, and collaborative information sharing continues to lead the growth in the overall software industry," says Frank Gens, senior vice president and chief analyst at IDC.

Two product groups comprise the total public cloud services market in IDC's software taxonomy: cloud Software and cloud infrastructure. Cloud software spending represented almost 86% of the total public cloud services market in 2013 while Cloud Infrastructure held the remaining 14%. The Cloud Software market includes two product categories: Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS).

The Cloud Infrastructure product group is comprised by only one product category: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), which at the same time is comprised by two markets, Server and Basic Storage. The top five vendors in this market are Amazon.com, which holds the first position with more than 40% of market share, RackSpace, IBM, CenturyLink, and Microsoft.

On a regional basis, the United States holds almost 68% of the market, which is much more than what it holds for traditional technologies. Western Europe holds 19% and the rest of the regions hold 5% or less each. By 2018, IDC forecasts that the U.S. share will drop to 59% while Western Europe will grow to 23% of market share. Emerging regions are also expected to grow above worldwide average, adds the research group.