Alibaba, the electronic commerce giant in China, has been developing a cloud computing business that aims to compete with established players in the industry.

The market for cloud computing services is currently dominated by Azure and Amazon Web Services. One of the minor players is the tech and consulting corporation IBM.

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At present the major worldwide competitors are based in the U.S. In a recent evaluation of the cloud computing industry, analysts at the tech research company Gartner mentioned 15 major players in the market. Out of the 15, Fujitsu and Dimension Data are the only non-U.S. firms. 

Alibaba was not recognized as a competitor in the cloud computing industry.

The company's cloud business dates back to 2009 and began as an online trading and settlement business. The customers that use the service other than Alibaba are usually small and medium Chinese firms.

The Chinese Internet page for the cloud services list mostly gaming and mobile agencies as subscribers. Alibaba said subscribers to its cloud services number 1 million, with the users tapping into the service either directly or through a reseller.

The company's progress has been sluggish with one small data center in Hong Kong and three big data centers in mainland China. Amazon Web Services, on the other hand, has 25 essential regional data centers worldwide with 52 smaller centers scattered around the globe.

Alibaba has not come close to the performance of its competitors. But for a Chinese company it is doing some impressive work by handling $5.8 billion in business on the heaviest shopping days in the country, according to The New York Times.

As of the moment, cloud companies based in the U.S. should not be worried about Alibaba's new business. In the future, however, subscribers to Alibaba's cloud servers are expected to spur its expansion into the global market.

TagsAlibaba Group, Amazon Web Services, Azure, Cloud, Cloud computing, Cloud computing services