Global cloud hosting and services provider Amazon Web Services (AWS) celebrates its fifth anniversary within Australia this month and reflected on how Australian cloud conversations have changed during this time.
Paul Migliorini, Managing Director for AWS in the region, says discussions with big Australian businesses commenced prior to the cloud giant’s physical arrival and reflected on the journey since that time.
“One of the really interesting milestones going back to 2012 was when Michael Hart, then CEO of the Commonwealth Bank, said we're going in all in on AWS. This was a statement of intent. He, relatively early, like a lot of big companies - like NewsCorp and AMP as well as the Commonwealth Bank - saw the potential for not only how we consume technology resources, but as a platform that would be transformational for our industry,” he said.
In 2012 and 2013 a lot of the conversations AWS was having with customers centred around infrastructure, he explained. Customers wanted to know is it secure? Does it scale? Is it enterprise-grade?
Five years later it’s a different story and the conversation has shifted. “Today Australian organisations want to more rapidly increase how they remove their legacy debt and move onto new infrastructure,” Migliorini stated.
{loadposition david08}The security, scalability and suitability of the cloud is now proven, he says, and customers come to AWS for two main reasons - to remove legacy debt and reduce friction on innovation.
As an example of removing legacy, Migliorini points to AMP. The large Australian business is a five-year-old AWS Australia customer and was considering its technology strategy at that time and considered cloud would be a key part of it. They reduced their x86 server infrastructure by 50% from lifting and shifting to AWS hosting and this reduced their costs by 30% from the beginning.
Regarding friction, Migliorini says this can be a number of things - how much data you can store, adopting machine learning, embracing new ways of working, having greater access to compute resources, and agility, as examples.
It also means organisations can experiment, with relatively low cost and velocity.
Migliorini adds, “over the last five years our customers have pushed us harder. We listen to what customers say they want. Over 90% of the things we build come from customer feedback and the other 10% is us building things on their behalf. We’re continually launching new services to meet the needs of our customers.”Migliorini adds, “over the last five years our customers have pushed us harder. We listen to what customers say they want. Over 90% of the things we build come from customer feedback and the other 10% is us building things on their behalf. We’re continually launching new services to meet the needs of our customers.”
AWS has also seen a proliferation of new technology and analytic partners that have been created since its time in the region. “We only see an exponential increase in imagination and appetite,” Migliorini says.
“We’re cutting through the friction that’s held Australian organisations back from innovation for many years.”
