Microsoft is making a sly move in its cloud war with Google

Microsoft on Wednesday announced plans to buy a start-up data center storage company, a move that represents a strike at archrival Google.

The software giant plans to buy Avere Systems, a provider of data center storage software and hardware based in Pittsburgh. Avere's products make it easier for companies to share their data warehouses between their own servers and massive cloud computing platforms such as Google Cloud or Microsoft Azure. The company's clients include the Library of Congress and the animation studio "Despicable Me" Illumination Mac Guff.

Microsoft cloud customers will benefit from the link, allowing them to run "the largest and most complex high-performance workloads" on Azure, Microsoft said in a blog post.

"We are excited to welcome Avere to Microsoft, and we look forward to the impact that their technology and equipment will have on Azure and the customer experience," said Microsoft.

The companies did not disclose the terms of the agreement or when they expect it to close.

 But in addition to helping the manufacturer of Windows, the agreement is a slip in Google.

Notably, in March, Avere received $ 14 million in funds from investors, including Google, not GV or CapitalG, the company's venture capital subsidiaries, but from the search giant itself. That unusual investment put Avere in an elite club of new companies backed by Google, including the mysterious Magic Leap, the developer of Pokémon Go Niantic and SpaceX by Elon Musk. At that time, the CEO of Avere, Ron Bianchini, told Business Insider that the relationship with Google came from a place of strategic overlap, that is, their joint interest in the so-called "hybrid" computer models.

Hybrid computer systems allow companies to combine both cloud-based services with their own servers on the site. The model is something that Google Cloud boss Diane Greene has been pursuing in recent years. Its momentum in hybrid systems has been a response to Microsoft, which has long claimed hybrid computing as part of its cloud computing advantage, since it already has a strong presence in corporate data centers with popular products such as Windows Server. and SQL Server. .

By taking Avere, Microsoft will add its storage experience to its own portfolio. It will also prevent Google from influencing the development of Avere. In addition, Microsoft will develop its current presence in Pittsburgh, where universities, including Carnegie Mellon, are creating highly trained hardware and software engineers.

The agreement will probably not change the trend in the cloud war by itself. But it's a good move by Microsoft to strengthen its position as the second cloud computing provider behind Amazon's market-leading web services.

Avere had raised $ 97 million from investors, including Menlo Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Tenaya Capital and Western Digital Technologies, as well as Google.

Last March, Bianchini told us he was confident that the $ 14 million that Avere had just raised would be "the last money we need." Thanks to Microsoft, it turned out that he was right.