Database as a service (DBaaS) - some cloud platforms offer options for using a database as a service, without physically launching a virtual machine instance for the database. In this configuration, application owners do not have to install and maintain the database on their own. Instead, the database service provider takes responsibility for installing and maintaining the database, and application owners pay according to their usage. For example, Amazon Web Services provides three database services as part of its cloud offering, SimpleDB, a NoSQL key-value store, Amazon Relational Database Service, an SQL-based database service with a MySQL interface, and DynamoDB. Similarly, Microsoft offers the Azure SQL Database service [3] as part of its cloud offering.