The AWS Summit Sydney rolled into town this week. With over 26 000 registered participants across 3 days, its Australia’s largest tech conference. It’s a chance for customers and prospective customers to learn about the latest innovations in the AWS eco-system.
After a successful 2018, RedBear was back as exhibitors at the event. There were common themes and messages at this year’s summit. The following are RedBear’s key takeaways from the 3 days.
The new builders
An idea is just an idea until someone builds it. AWS very much see themselves as the enablers for the new breed of builders of the 21st century. The AWS platform is a rich set of tools that put some of the most sophisticated capabilities in the hands of every builder.
These new builders should be focussing on business logic and the user experience. If you want access to these capabilities, to be able to innovate, you need to be in the Cloud today. In 2019, the AWS Cloud makes it easier for the plumbing to “just work”, freeing up more time to focus on these business building activities.
Smaller, more nimble organisations are moving faster. Larger enterprises still seem to suffer from a fear of what they might lose. It’s natural to be wary of change but we see an opportunity for both ends of the spectrum to learn from each other. Startups can learn how to do things the right way from Day 1. Enterprises can learn how to move faster, to experiment and learn and grow.
Innovate at scale. Safely
You remember when AWS said security is a job zero requirement? It still is.
AWS is more committed than ever to offering secure services. It continues to innovate in this area offering more security related services than any other Cloud provider. Our customers want the ability to be the new builders, to be in the Cloud, but they want to do it they right way. They want to modernise their operations and they want their customer’s data to be safe.
At RedBear, we understand the critical importance of our clients workloads and data. It’s why we built a Cloud security consulting and managed services practice. We continue to be excited by the ever expanding AWS offerings in this space. The rich AWS toolset allows us to transform the Security Operations of our customers. We can now delivery security as code and deliver automated responses to security incidents.
Machine Learning and AI are the new normal
Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence is mainstream. At the AWS Summit Sydney, it was clear that it’s no longer the realm of the rich and deep of pocket
We heard how Rugby Australia and Surf Lifesaving are using these tools to improve players and save lives. It’s an area of serious investment and focus and it promises to deliver some significant opportunities.
AWS offer services both below the line – for the data scientists – and above the line – for the rest of us – in the shape of Rekognition and Lex to name but a few. It’s brought the power of data and the power of natural language close together and put it in all our hands.
The beauty of the AWS eco-systems is the way you can integrate all these services to deliver real world value to your customers. For example, integrating the call centre as a service offering, AWS Connect, with, Polly, Comprehend and back end data stores to understand sentiment and provide a personalised service to customers.
Specialise and collaborate
No-one can be an expert at everything.
At the time of the AWS Summit Sydney, there were 165 AWS services. In 2019, we should be offering differentiated services to our customers. Enterprise customers in particular are looking for specialised and deeply skilled partners to solve challenges and realise opportunities. Nowadays, it’s not uncommon to see a raft of partners working together with a customer. Each partner is bringing its own specialist skill to the table and collaborating to achieve the outcome for the customer and their customers.
Gone are the days of “one partner to rule them all”.
At RedBear, our team is broadly skilled across a wide spectrum of services. However, they are super deep in specific areas. In our case, that’s around Cloud security and Financial Services.
If you couldn’t make it to the AWS Summit Sydney
If you missed out on the AWS Summit Sydney this year, feel free to contact us for some more detailed insights on the event and to learn how you can write your own story with the AWS Cloud.
