a
aws simplified

What is AWS? – Definition, Training, and more.

Travor House A self-motivated digital marketing specialist with 3+ years of experience advertising in the financial services industry. While I wear several marketing hats, my primary focus is on content strategy and curation. I aim to consistently challenge myself and position my skills toward personal and professional endeavors that lead to measurable results. LinkedIn

Definition of AWS Cloud Computing Provider

What is AWS?

Before the advent of cloud computing, the world faced several challenges in terms of scalability, redundancy, and server provisioning. In order to establish any sort of digital infrastructure, organizations had to invest in their own hardware, servers, and data centers, while also hiring staff to manage the entire setup. This exclusive approach meant that startups and financially constrained businesses found it exceptionally difficult to secure the necessary capital upfront to launch their first website or build a database. The absence of cloud computing created a barrier for entry into the digital realm, hindering innovation and growth for smaller entities. Additionally, organizations had to cope with the risk of overprovisioning, where they invested heavily in resources to accommodate unexpected spikes in capacity. These challenges in scalability, redundancy, and cost management limited the accessibility and feasibility of establishing a strong digital presence for many businesses.

AWS offers businesses a comprehensive suite of integrated services designed to optimize various aspects of their operations. With a market-leading 32.4% share, Amazon is the go-to cloud provider trusted by countless organizations worldwide. The beauty of AWS lies in its pay-as-you-go model, allowing businesses to scale their usage according to their needs. The less you use, the less you pay, and the more you use, the less you pay per unit.

However, AWS goes beyond mere cost-effectiveness. It was born out of Amazon’s own need to expand its internal IT infrastructure, but it has since grown into a multi-billion-dollar company. Today, AWS not only supports Amazon’s IT backbone but also empowers industry titans like Netflix, Dropbox, and Reddit, among others. This level of trust and widespread adoption speaks volumes about the reliability and capabilities of AWS.

AWS operates as an “Operating System of the Internet,” treating different hardware resources as isolated components within this ecosystem. These resources are then transformed into managed services, effectively removing the burden of managing hardware and physical infrastructure from developers’ shoulders. This revolutionary approach eliminates the need for businesses to invest precious time and resources in maintaining their infrastructure and instead allows them to focus on their core value proposition.

By leveraging AWS, businesses can fully channel their energies into what sets them apart – their unique offerings, customer experiences, and innovative solutions. The freedom from infrastructure management enables them to drive growth, enhance products or services, and stay ahead of the competition. AWS truly empowers organizations to concentrate on what matters most – their business case – while benefiting from a world-class cloud infrastructure that adapts seamlessly to their evolving needs.

AWS Learning Opportunities

Amazon offers training courses and events designed to help individuals build and validate their skills so that they can maximize the full potential of the cloud. These courses are regularly adjusted with AWS updates so that users are leveraging the latest cloud skills.

Both digital and classroom learning opportunities are available depending on the user’s preference for various services for things like IoT and big data. With classroom training, AWS experts will teach the class and provide best practices, while virtual training allows you to learn from anywhere at your own pace.

Due to COVID-19, some in-person learning options may be limited or changed to virtual sessions.

APN Partner Training

The Amazon Partner Network (APN) is a global program designed for technology and consulting AWS experts to build solutions for customers. The APN offers proprietary tools and support that help companies grow, market, and sell their AWS offerings.

Partners can deepen their learning and capabilities through training courses. These courses give partners the chance to become AWS certified as a cloud practitioner, architect, developer, and operations.

Enterprise Training

AWS offers courses geared towards helping enterprises achieve business goals by building cloud fluency across their organization. These learning resources can help companies create a culture of innovation and modernize current processes.

Learning Paths by Solutions or Roles

Whether you’re interested in training for a particular role or want to grasp different solutions, Amazon offers learning paths to help you.

Role learning paths:
• Cloud Practitioner
• Architect
• Developer
• Operations

Solution learning paths:
• Databases
• Machine Learning
Media Services
• Storage

Pop-up Lofts

Amazon has “pop-up lofts” in San Francisco, New York, Berlin, Tel Aviv, and London used as workspaces and to learn about AWS opportunities. Due to COVID-19, these locations are indefinitely closed.

Events and Webinars

Amazon hosts, both online and in-person, events to bring the cloud computing community together. These events are designed for enthusiasts to collaborate, connect, and learn about the potential of AWS.

AWS Facts

  • AWS has deployed 5 times more cloud infrastructure than competitors combined.
  • 190 countries AWS has customers in.
  • 8,000+ partner network members.
  • 1,900+ third-party products.

Companies using AWS

Companies of all sizes use AWS services in some shape or form. According to Intricately, Amazon has 1,240,804 users utilizing their products and services as of July 6th, 2020.

A few of the big monthly spenders include:

1. Netflix - $19 Million

2. Twitch - $15 Million

3. LinkedIn - $13 Million

4. Facebook - $11 Million

5. Turner Broadcasting - $10 Million

6. BBC - $9 Million

7. Baidu - $9 Million

8. ESPN - $8 Million

9. Adobe - $8 Million

10. Twitter - $7 Million

History of AWS since the beginning

History of AWS

Cloud computing has revolutionized the world of computing and IT, bringing about significant changes and advancements. Before the advent of cloud technology, businesses faced numerous challenges in terms of scalability, redundancy, and server provisioning. To establish a digital presence, companies had to invest heavily in purchasing their own hardware, servers, data centers, and hiring staff to manage them. This posed a significant barrier, particularly for start-ups and cash-strapped businesses, as they struggled to gather enough capital to launch websites or build databases.

However, the introduction of cloud computing has completely transformed this landscape. Companies now have the option to trade capital expenses for variable expenses, eliminating the need for upfront investments in expensive hardware and infrastructure. This shift towards variable expenses has empowered businesses of all sizes, allowing them to allocate financial resources more efficiently and effectively. By leveraging cloud infrastructure, companies can benefit from massive economies of scale, as cloud providers can optimize their resources to serve multiple clients simultaneously.

Cloud computing also enhances speed and agility in IT operations. With on-demand access to resources, businesses can quickly deploy and provision servers, launch new applications or websites, and respond rapidly to changing market demands. This increased agility enables companies to bring products and services to market faster, providing a competitive edge in today’s fast-paced business landscape.

Furthermore, the cloud allows businesses to focus on what truly matters - their core competencies and objectives. By offloading infrastructure management and maintenance to cloud providers, companies can free up valuable time and resources that can be redirected towards innovation, developing new features, and improving customer experiences. This shift enables companies to concentrate on strategic initiatives that drive their growth and success.

Amazon was the first company to market cloud infrastructure services when they launched Amazon EC2 in 2006. They had a monopoly on this service until competitors like Microsoft and Google responded with their cloud infrastructure services in 2008.

2002 - The platform was launched

2003 - Concept was reformulated with standardized plans

2004 - The first service (Simple Queue Service) launched for public usage

2006 - Official re-launch with Amazon EC2

2009 - Virtual Private Cloud launches

2012 - Holds first customer event

2013 - CIA adoption

2016 - Reaches 10 billion in revenue target

2017 - 100 services in total

2018 - Signs 10 billion dollar contract with the Pentagon

Did we miss something?


Speak To An AWS Expert

Why Amazon Lambda?

Lambda offers a multitude of benefits, making it an ideal choice for your computing needs. By simply uploading your code as a ZIP file or container image, Lambda effortlessly locates the required computing power and executes it based on incoming traffic. This seamless process allows you to focus on your application’s functionality without worrying about infrastructure management.

One of the key advantages of Lambda is its ability to work harmoniously with other AWS services through a few simple calls from your application. This integration saves you time and effort, as Lambda is optimized to collaborate effortlessly with services such as S3, Cognito, and DynamoDB.

Another notable benefit of Lambda is the option to enable Provisioned Concurrency, allowing you to run your program back-to-back in a matter of milliseconds. This feature ensures that your application remains responsive and delivers consistent performance, even during periods of high demand.

By default, Lambda is capable of working with a wide selection of programming languages including Node.js, Java, and Python. For testing functionality and building, Lambda files can be developed on both serverless and container applications such as AWS SAM.

Travor House

Travor House

A self-motivated digital marketing specialist with 3+ years of experience advertising in the financial services industry.

While I wear several marketing hats, my primary focus is on content strategy and curation.

I aim to consistently challenge myself and position my skills toward personal and professional endeavors that lead to measurable results.

Related Articles

AWS Snowflake Data Warehouse Pricing Guide

AWS Snowflake Data Warehouse Pricing Guide

AWS Snowflake Data Warehouse – or just Snowflake – is a data cloud built for users to mobilize, centralize, and process large quantities of data. Regardless of how many sources are connected to Snowflake or the user’s preferred type of organized data used, data is easily stored and controllably shared with selectively-authorized access. Snowflake does offer extensive control over its pricing, though how it works isn’t always clear.

Single-Tenant vs. Multi-Tenant Cloud Environments

Single-Tenant vs. Multi-Tenant Cloud Environments

Operating a cloud environment and optimizing Software as a Service can be managed in two different methods. Reasons for adopting either single-tenant or multi-tenant cloud environments are dependent on business and customer-related factors as well as how much more expensive one architectural structure will be over the other. Both structure types also have a number of security and privacy implications tied to their inherent design.

Guide to Cost Factors for Amazon’s RDS Pricing

Guide to Cost Factors for Amazon’s RDS Pricing

Amazon sports a complex pricing model. As simple as the pay-for-what-you-use model sounds, there are several nuances to every service from data used to computing components chosen that can easily let users blow through their entire budget. That’s not to say AWS is an inherently expensive platform and can be adapted to with proper planning and understanding of the contributing factors to billing.

Download our 10-Step Cloud Migration ChecklistYou'll get direct access to our full-length guide on Google Docs. From here, you will be able to make a copy, download the content, and share it with your team.