Pricing Model of Cloud Computing Service with Partial Multihoming

Currently the articles about pricing strategy and business operation of cloud computing are rare, and most of these articles focus on the discussion of the prices given by industry leaders or the improvement in these prices, which cannot reflect market supply and demand as well as customers’ needs. By using the theory of two-sided markets, this paper analyzes the pricing model and operating strategy of cloud computing with partial multihoming, and compares with previous studies to explore the impact of partial multihoming on carriers’ strategy. The results show that when users and developers are partial multihoming, carriers will eventually occupy the same market shares, but the market shares are expanded; the number of multihoming users (or developers) would increase by the enhancing of the cross-side network effect or the decreasing of the services or resources differentiation among various cloud computing services; the behavior of partial multihoming may reduce the prices and profits of carriers. So in commercial operation, carriers should take measures to reduce the number of multihoming customers.