Source: Sharecast
According to the Competition and Markets Authority, market concentration and barriers to entry in the market for cloud services have given the two companies "significant unilateral" market power and allowed them to generate undue profits.
Amazon and Microsoft both have an approximately 30-40% share of the infrastructure-as-a-service market.
For Microsoft, the watchdog "misses the mark again, ignoring that the cloud market has never been so dynamic and competitive, with record investment, and rapid, AI-driven changes."
Through their data centres, cloud service providers offer businesses enhanced abilities to process and store data, as well as to manage networks.
Google, the third-largest player in the IaaS market, lauded the CMA's decision, saying that it would unleash choice, innovation and economic growth in the UK.