When people ask, I like to say that the most interesting thing about Datum isn’t what we’re building, but who we’re building it for: the next 1k clouds.
Of course, this statement usually elicits a nervous chuckle, if not an actual laugh out loud. “1000 clouds? That’s crazy!” But once you align on a definition that embraces how modern developers build and operate software, it’s pretty easy to see how today’s ecosystem of specialized service providers can grow into the thousands.
Between database providers, GPU specialists, observability platforms, security services, and AI infrastructure—the specialized services ecosystem is already in the hundreds and growing fast.
Who better to run elasticsearch than Elastic, to scale data warehouses than Snowflake, or to provide observability than Grafana? Who better to integrate Nvidia technology (silicon, networking, etc) than CoreWeave, or AMD technology than Tensorwave? Who better to solve gnarly authorization and identity problems than AuthZed or Clerk, and who would you trust more to orchestrate the data underneath your invoicing than Metronome or Amberflo?
This isn’t to say that anyone is moving beyond the hyperscale clouds. In fact, almost every Alt Cloud we know builds on top of these bedrock platforms, among others. Accelerated by the AI revolution, a new class of modern service providers are changing how we think about innovation, scaling services, and delivering value with software.
From Service Provider to Alt Cloud
At Datum, we hold a special place in our hearts for service providers, mainly because we’ve walked in those shoes for a long time.
The term “service provider” evolved from Adam Smith’s economic concepts of specialization in the Wealth of Nations to a late 20th century definition around outsourced functions like IT, telecom, and later cloud services (CSPs).
For such a humble moniker, these providers offer services that underpin our digital world: the unspoken heroes that quite literally keep the lights on. These are the companies that people only seem to notice when there is an outage and things grind to a halt.
In the post cloud native world, it’s clear the circle of critical operators has expanded substantially. In addition to network service providers and cloud service providers, we’ve come to rely on an ecosystem of specialized providers that run our databases, our identity services, our security services, and of course a whole host of AI-specific services.
Enter the Alt Clouds — a hip name we borrowed from David Linthicum to draw a circle around the new class of modern, purpose-built service providers.
Towards a shared definition, starting on GitHub
Ever since Jamie York (@ziadoz) created the very first list (awesome-php) as a gist of “awesome PHP libraries that are awesome”, the internet has been in love with these simple, curated artifacts.
As we explored the Alt Clouds ecosystem, it became obvious that we needed to start cataloguing these providers. We jotted down each one we could remember, organized the categories as best we could, and started to take suggestions.
We broadly define Alt Clouds as non-hyperscale providers delivering specialized infrastructure and related services. These “modern service providers” cater to specific workloads, compliance requirements, and developer needs — and because they are so focused, they can often do it in a way that is very compelling. From databases and GPUs, to metering, authorization, security, here’s how we think about it:
- If you provide value “as a service” directly on top of infra, you’re probably an Alt Cloud.
- If you go down, and your customers start an incident, you’re probably an Alt Cloud.
- If you have an SLA folks care about, you’re probably an Alt Cloud.
- If you offer public pricing, a usage model, and full automation, you’re an Alt Cloud.
Some folks would raise their hand and say: isn’t this all just SaaS, but more grown up? It’s a fair point! Clearly, each of these attributes have their roots in SaaS, but the way in which developers and companies integrate these services has changed. It’s no longer ancillary to their business, it’s core, and yet they still want it run as a service.
Building Datum from a mission point of view
Our mission to help 1k clouds thrive in the AI era germinated long before we built an Awesome list or put a definition to Alt Clouds. In fact, it started as a much simpler and humble ambition: to help connect others to their advantage.
This is an idea that has animated me for well over a decade, and it inspired us to ask the question: how can more companies tap into the superpowers that hyperscalers have? And what would happen if they did?
In short, we think really good things happen. Not because the hyperscalers lose, but because new services can take root and create competition that makes us all better. Translating that mission into reality is a daily practice at Datum: from our commitment to working in the open and deep investments in Milo, to our recent acquisition of CloudValid.
In fact, everything we do is inspired by a question: how can we help Alt Clouds thrive? If you fit our definition (or plan to in the future!) we hope you’ll reach out.