[graemep]

I am not convinced by that. What are you defining as "cloud" here? If you mean SaaS I interpreted GP as meaning the likes of AWS which still leaves you doing a lot of the expensive stuff.

> The idea that cloud is obviously more expensive is not actually supported by the economics. If it was, we'd see people leaving the cloud in droves, for competitive reasons.

You are assuming that 1) the people making the decisions have perfectly aligned incentives 2) that they have got the economics right and 3) its a significant part of their cost base. In reality it is often the case that something like AWS is the CYA choice (if an AWS data centre is down its their fault, if on-prem is down its your fault), its the shareholder's money, and its cheap compared to the rest of your costs. If something is 0.5% of your fixed costs no one is going to notice that it could be 0.1%.