I was having coffee with Javier Soltero, former CEO of Hyperic, which was acquired by SpringSource and subsequently by VMware, and we were talking about the latest trends in cloud computing. Given the disruptive nature of cloud computing and SaaS (software as a service), it seems that if these technologies really take off, it will be a battle fought in the big leagues by billion-dollar companies, rather than scrappy startups. Javier called it a forthcoming "clash of the titans," and I think it's an appropriate view.

Sure there are dozens of startups out there with cloud deployment models, cloud scaling software, cloud monitoring solutions, and so on, but I am not sure these will be stand-alone businesses -- at least not on the scale that enables them to compete with the likes of Amazon, Sun, Microsoft, VMware, and other large systems or software companies.

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It's possible that a startup can disrupt this space and come from nowhere, but I think the big disruption already happened: Amazon took this business right from under the noses of the traditional systems companies and created a lean business that is now generating somewhere around $400 million in revenue. It seems unlikely that someone else can come in and disrupt the disruptor.

Amazon has also now just announced a beta program for a Virtual Private Cloud offering that could take the wind out of several startups. And Rackspace announced its own tools for development, deployment, management, and monitoring cloud applications. No doubt we'll see more announcements coming this way in next week's VMware conference.