The Windows Azure cloud platform includes Windows Azure, a Web-based Microsoft SQL Azure, and connectivity / interoperability services with .NET Services. As with other Cloud platforms, Azure is a consumption-based pricing model. A summary of the pricing is below and more details can be found here:
– Compute @ $0.12 / hour
– Storage @ $0.15 / GB stored
– Storage Transactions @ $0.01 / 10K
SQL Azure:
– Web Edition – Up to 1GB relational database @ $9.99
– Business Edition – Up to 10GB relational database @ $99.99
.NET Services:
Messages @ $0.15/100K message operations, including Service Bus messages and Access Control tokens
Bandwidth across all three services will be charged at $0.10 in / $0.15 out / GB.
The Windows Azure blog details a service-level agreement that covers service uptime, connectivity, and data availability. The Azure SDK can be downloaded here.
It remains to be seen how Azure pans out but I am sure it will be a serious cloud player and it is nice to see a little pressure put on Amazon not only in terms of pricing but also for the intellectual ‘one-man upmanship’ this is sure to bring which can only be good for all companies working with cloud.
