### Azure Outage Disrupts Global Services, Boosts Interest in Decentralized Cloud Solutions
A recent outage in Microsoft’s Azure cloud service caused significant disruptions worldwide, affecting 23,000 flights and paralyzing services in sectors including aviation, telecommunications, finance, and healthcare. The incident has highlighted the vulnerabilities inherent in centralized cloud systems and spurred interest in decentralized alternatives.
Azure, the second-largest cloud service provider with a 25% global market share, enables companies to store and manage data without maintaining their own server infrastructure. The recent disruption impacted 8.5 million devices running Microsoft Windows, with estimated damages exceeding 1.4 trillion won.
The cloud market is experiencing rapid growth, with an annual growth rate of 20%. The market is projected to reach approximately 663 billion dollars this year. Despite its convenience, cloud services pose potential risks, particularly as small and medium-sized enterprises depend heavily on large tech companies. Issues within a single provider can lead to widespread global disruptions.
The Azure outage has underscored the fragility of centralized cloud services, leading to increased interest in decentralized cloud computing. Key players in this space include Akash Network and Io.net.
### Akash Network: A Proven Decentralized Cloud Platform
Akash Network is a decentralized cloud platform built on its own mainnet blockchain using the Cosmos SDK. Through its Akash Marketplace, the network connects providers of computing power, including CPU, GPU, memory, and storage, with users seeking services. Payments are exclusively conducted using Akash tokens (AKT).
Currently, over 2,000 services are provided by more than 80 suppliers on the Akash Network. The platform facilitates the rapid and cost-effective acquisition of GPUs, essential for AI model training, even in the face of computational power shortages.
Graduate student Ishan Dhanani of Columbia University’s Computer Science department exemplified the platform’s utility by leasing an Nvidia A100 GPU through Akash Network for just $1.10 per hour. Traditionally, such hardware costs around $15,000.
A recent research paper titled “Unified Auto-Encoding with Masked Diffusion,” co-authored by teams from the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Alberta, utilized the Akash Supercloud. The study leveraged NVIDIA A100 GPU clusters accessed via the Akash Network, highlighting the effective employment of Akash’s cloud computing resources for high-performance tasks.
### Io.net: Decentralized GPU Network Offering Unlimited Computing Power
Io.net is a decentralized GPU network built on the Solana mainnet, designed to provide limitless computing power for machine learning applications. The platform’s architecture includes GPU providers, users, and the Io.net platform itself.
Io.net targets independent data centers, cryptocurrency proof-of-work resources, and idle consumer GPUs to expand computing supply. Decentralized physical infrastructure networks like Io.net distribute tasks across multiple independent nodes, mitigating the risk of single points of failure. Should some nodes go offline, remaining nodes continue functioning, ensuring overall service availability and enhanced fault tolerance compared to centralized cloud systems.
The Azure outage has starkly exposed the weaknesses of centralized cloud services, putting decentralized cloud computing solutions like Akash Network and Io.net in the spotlight. These platforms offer robust fault tolerance and cost savings, making them compelling alternatives in an increasingly digital world.
