Big Cloud Players, Other Hyperscalers Spend $26B on Capex in Q3 2018

The capex of hyperscale operators topped $26 billion in the third quarter of 2018, according to the latest numbers from Synergy Research Group. This continues a strong year of hyperscale capex spending, which grew 53 percent for the first three quarters of 2018 compared with the same period in 2017. According to Synergy’s research, for the last 10 quarters the top five group of spenders has always consisted of Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, and Facebook, which in aggregate account for 70 percent of hyperscale capex. Microsoft capex reached a record level in Q3, while capex at the other four leaders dropped off marginally compared with the all-time highs seen in the previous quarter.