The Exchanges

Q We did. So for granted that it's shocking that it's like eye opening. Actually, that brings me to an interesting question. Are you seeing government, you know, their government clients do startup like things now because of this?

A We are, we are. And it's really cool. So the, a couple of examples I'll say is like, Which is a new group that started out of GSA. 18 F is based on the street it's on, 18 F. There's sort of this little internal SWAT team of techies that are going in, and they're helping government with their projects, number one projects that weren't doing as well, or new projects they're trying to get off the ground. And they're trying to use innovative technologies, and AWS, of course, is core to what they go to, because they're like, okay, let's get your infrastructure up, let's get going, let's move fast. And then also the digital services office. I think they're a really great example. Those kind of things are happening, and I see that around the world. Liam Maxwell, who's the CTO of the UK government, sort of started the same kind of trend in the UK where he said, we are spending way too much money on tech and not getting the benefits. They've created their own digital service, and they're starting to put also policies and mandates in place that says, wait a minute, don't go out and buy Uh, like a bunch of servers when you can go to cloud. Show me why you can't use cloud. New procurements have to go through this group to say, why not cloud?

AI assessment note: “We are, we are. And it's really cool. So the, a couple of examples”

Q we started, which is this notion of what is cloud. You know, with all the customers you talk to, U.S., federal, education, Nonprofit around the world. What's the moment when you see an aha light up? Like when you're, you know, talking to them about what it is and why it's useful to them? Like what, what's the moment where there's like this, like their eyes, like they get it.

A I mean, you see it in their eyes at re-invent and they see the level of innovation. That is pretty mind blowing. I hear customers on stage like GE and Capital One and the intelligence community Talking about what they've been able to achieve. NASA. And I've had customers say to me, that was the moment for me when I saw how you were innovating. Like, they say, if they can do this, I can do this. I think the moment they get it is not when they see it, but when they run their first, like, workload. They see these instances spin up and how quickly they can build something and try it and modify it. The lights just go on. And then once they dive in and they understand the security and compliance, it, it is really like, okay, let's go, let's get moving.

AI assessment note: “when they run their first, like, workload. They see these instances spin up”

Q we started, which is this notion of what is cloud. You know, with all the customers you talk to, U.S., federal, education, Nonprofit around the world. What's the moment when you see an aha light up? Like when you're, you know, talking to them about what it is and why it's useful to them? Like what, what's the moment where there's like this, like their eyes, like they get it.

A I mean, you see it in their eyes at re-invent and they see the level of innovation. That is pretty mind blowing. I hear customers on stage like GE and Capital One and the intelligence community Talking about what they've been able to achieve. NASA. And I've had customers say to me, that was the moment for me when I saw how you were innovating. Like, they say, if they can do this, I can do this. I think the moment they get it is not when they see it, but when they run their first, like, workload. They see these instances spin up and how quickly they can build something and try it and modify it. The lights just go on. And then once they dive in and they understand the security and compliance, it, it is really like, okay, let's go, let's get moving.

AI assessment note: “the moment they get it is not when they see it, but when they run their first”

Q It makes perfect sense, and that brings me to my very last question, which is, what's your view on this notion of hybrid cloud? It's not so much one or the other, but are people really benefiting from one or the other?

A Well, in terms of the hybrid cloud model, we believe that's around for a long time, because customers, you know, they're not going to transition overnight, and they need to be able to take advantage of what they built over the years. Now we want to help them move and get progressive as fast as we can into, uh, AWS cloud. But at the same time, we, we built tons of tooling now so that they can actually take advantage of what they have. So this, this sense of a hybrid cloud, I think, you know, is there and is, and is, can be utilized in many ways for many missions. And we want to be able to take advantage of what the customers have invested.

AI assessment note: “in terms of the hybrid cloud model, we believe that's around for a long time”

Q We did. So for granted that it's shocking that it's like eye opening. Actually, that brings me to an interesting question. Are you seeing government, you know, their government clients do startup like things now because of this?

A We are, we are. And it's really cool. So the, a couple of examples I'll say is like, Which is a new group that started out of GSA. 18 F is based on the street it's on, 18 F. There's sort of this little internal SWAT team of techies that are going in, and they're helping government with their projects, number one projects that weren't doing as well, or new projects they're trying to get off the ground. And they're trying to use innovative technologies, and AWS, of course, is core to what they go to, because they're like, okay, let's get your infrastructure up, let's get going, let's move fast. And then also the digital services office. I think they're a really great example. Those kind of things are happening, and I see that around the world. Liam Maxwell, who's the CTO of the UK government, sort of started the same kind of trend in the UK where he said, we are spending way too much money on tech and not getting the benefits. They've created their own digital service, and they're starting to put also policies and mandates in place that says, wait a minute, don't go out and buy Uh, like a bunch of servers when you can go to cloud. Show me why you can't use cloud. New procurements have to go through this group to say, why not cloud?

AI assessment note: “We are, we are. And it's really cool. So the, a couple of examples”

Q By innovation center, you mean like a physical space?

A It's a physical space where we will staff and they will staff. It'll be very cool like an AWS pop-up where we'll bring people in. I love that. You know, we'll be able to talk about You know, new technology trends, support these startups and the way they get going, new entrepreneurs, uh, do training and education, special guest speaking. Maybe you can come over and be one of our guest, uh, podcast gurus. And then the other, the other group that's really exciting is in Bahrain with the economic development group and C five capital, which is a great partner of ours. It's in Europe and the Middle East. And we have an innovation center there that's been created in partnership with the three of us, and that facility is getting ready to open soon, and that's for across all of the GCC. So now we're creating these partners from a public-private perspective on a worldwide basis.

AI assessment note: “It's a physical space where we will staff and they will staff.”

Q Do the people who have those private instances also benefit then? How did that, how does that play out?

A They can. If they go and they say, I'm just going to build this private cloud, which generally means putting servers in a data center. That's not a scalable model, but what we help them do when you combine, and we work within these clouds, we have a model called Direct Connect, as an example, and that Direct Connect is where we take and we direct from our data centers into the customers, and we, it doesn't go through the internet, so it's directly, you know, from one data center to another. This allows them to scale what they're doing, do analytics, so you can combine the two. So it's not a one or the other, if that makes sense.

AI assessment note: “They can. If they go and they say, I'm just going to build”

Q By innovation center, you mean like a physical space?

A It's a physical space where we will staff and they will staff. It'll be very cool like an AWS pop-up where we'll bring people in. I love that. You know, we'll be able to talk about You know, new technology trends, support these startups and the way they get going, new entrepreneurs, uh, do training and education, special guest speaking. Maybe you can come over and be one of our guest, uh, podcast gurus. And then the other, the other group that's really exciting is in Bahrain with the economic development group and C five capital, which is a great partner of ours. It's in Europe and the Middle East. And we have an innovation center there that's been created in partnership with the three of us, and that facility is getting ready to open soon, and that's for across all of the GCC. So now we're creating these partners from a public-private perspective on a worldwide basis.

AI assessment note: “It's a physical space where we will staff and they will staff.”

Q I mean, even private companies still have that concern. They're standing at private clouds. And so how did you, how did you kind of overcome that?

A We said, we've said the whole time that we were going, going to meet and or exceed security and compliance requirements of our customers. And that's not only been for public sector, it's been for every market, financial health. And as a result of that, we did get very aggressive. And we got, we rolled our sleeves up, and we got in the game with not only helping government define what actual cloud computing was, but we also worked with GSA and the FedRAMP, the General Services Administration, who was in charge of, at the time, and OMB, the Office of Management and Budget, on, number one, what is cloud, but also what is the right security and compliance model for And in fact, they had a really, um, they had sort of an outdated security and compliance model called FISMA, which was a paper-based model, which was a law, a mandate for how they looked at security and compliance, and then they moved to this model for cloud called FedRAMP, and FedRAMP is really a model that takes in controls. They look at security and compliance controls, and And it's a model that also is set up to be more continuously monitored, so it's less of the paper-based, which is really good, because you think about a paper-based security model.

AI assessment note: “meet and or exceed security and compliance requirements of our customers”

Q Right. So you mentioned encryption. Are you seeing, you know, given recent political news and the context that the discussions and debates are playing out, are you seeing people ask more questions? Are you asking people, see people ask different questions? How are you guys tackling this one?

A Well, you know, it's interesting because I'd like to see them sometimes even ask more questions. Like some do, but I think we even, I was just on a panel last week and I was surprised about cyber and I was shocked encryption didn't come up and I actually brought it up. Uh, because now encryption, to me, should just be a standard. Like, encryption should just be a standard for customers who have sensitive data, and they should manage the keys, and we provide all that for them so they can set it up, have their own keys, and access and have analytics around that. So, um, I, I, we believe it will be a standard, and we always recommend it. We always recommend encryption.

AI assessment note: “I'd like to see them sometimes even ask more questions. Like some do”

Q Right. So you mentioned encryption. Are you seeing, you know, given recent political news and the context that the discussions and debates are playing out, are you seeing people ask more questions? Are you asking people, see people ask different questions? How are you guys tackling this one?

A Well, you know, it's interesting because I'd like to see them sometimes even ask more questions. Like some do, but I think we even, I was just on a panel last week and I was surprised about cyber and I was shocked encryption didn't come up and I actually brought it up. Uh, because now encryption, to me, should just be a standard. Like, encryption should just be a standard for customers who have sensitive data, and they should manage the keys, and we provide all that for them so they can set it up, have their own keys, and access and have analytics around that. So, um, I, I, we believe it will be a standard, and we always recommend it. We always recommend encryption.

AI assessment note: “I'd like to see them sometimes even ask more questions. Like some do”

Q So, you know, you started off saying how the world is small, and clearly some of the issues are actually pretty universal and similar. What are some of the The differences besides data sovereignty and some of the policy related, are there any other cultural differences or other observations you've had from your reps on the ground and your own experiences abroad?

A Obviously, everywhere we go, we do try to really understand what is the most important things to the customer. And we, we talk about beginning sort of with the end in mind or the working backwards process where we say, what, if we, if we wrote a press release today, what would that look like? And we think about that for every country, every customer. What would we want it to say? And I think you always find, yes, there are some unique things to each organization or country that you go into, but, but at the end of the day, when you get down to the actual technology and the processes, they are very similar. The issues are very similar. The words may be a little different, but they're actually very, very similar, and in fact, just a point on that, we are We are working very hard when we go into these countries to explain to them what's already been put in place with security and compliance regimes, like SOC one, SOC two.

AI assessment note: “when you get down to the actual technology and the processes, they are very similar.”

Q their needs, as opposed to just translating their paper needs into digital, which is, I think, a mistake a lot of people make when they go on this path. You said something really interesting though, and I just realized we've never actually done this on the podcast. If you take a step back, how did you, with them, define the cloud? Because people all have the same definition of that.

A Well, you know, cloud itself was not an unknown principle here, obviously, and you do have a lot of innovators in government, and as an example, NIST, which is the National Institute for Standards and Technology, has always been a group that has been looking at what's going on in the market, right? And so, because Vivek Kundra, who was the CIO of the U.S. government at the time, he came in and started saying, Why are we spending all this money on wasted projects and buying all this IT and we can't account for actually the success of what we've spent? And he said, look, there's these new technologies out there called cloud, and Amazon Web Services is one of them. So because of him, it actually paved the way for us to get super aggressive, and we went in and we worked with NIST. They were very open to it on sharing with them how AWS works and the principles. We had these basic Principles.

AI assessment note: “we went in and we worked with NIST. They were very open to it”

Q their needs, as opposed to just translating their paper needs into digital, which is, I think, a mistake a lot of people make when they go on this path. You said something really interesting though, and I just realized we've never actually done this on the podcast. If you take a step back, how did you, with them, define the cloud? Because people all have the same definition of that.

A Well, you know, cloud itself was not an unknown principle here, obviously, and you do have a lot of innovators in government, and as an example, NIST, which is the National Institute for Standards and Technology, has always been a group that has been looking at what's going on in the market, right? And so, because Vivek Kundra, who was the CIO of the U.S. government at the time, he came in and started saying, Why are we spending all this money on wasted projects and buying all this IT and we can't account for actually the success of what we've spent? And he said, look, there's these new technologies out there called cloud, and Amazon Web Services is one of them. So because of him, it actually paved the way for us to get super aggressive, and we went in and we worked with NIST. They were very open to it on sharing with them how AWS works and the principles. We had these basic Principles.

AI assessment note: “we worked with NIST. They were very open to it on sharing with them”

Q Are they really innovating those customers or are they just so coming out of this bad, you know, experience from before where they're just no longer have to worry about plumbing, that they're just finally able to do their jobs. Is there really like, what's the kind of spectrum of that to really innovating?

A I think it's across all, but you did sort of hit the nail on the head. The average government agency is behind in the, the types of infrastructure and tools they're running. So I think for them, it is sort of, they see it as a path forward to getting things done faster, quicker, having agility. But for others, I think, and there are a lot of new missions, I think for them, it's like, wow, I can, I can do this much faster. You know, I, I can really run this, I can do this faster, and I can demonstrate the results. And in government, we, Have not often talked about results delivered. And now with cloud, what we're seeing.

AI assessment note: “I think it's across all, but you did sort of hit the nail on the head.”

Q So, you know, you started off saying how the world is small, and clearly some of the issues are actually pretty universal and similar. What are some of the The differences besides data sovereignty and some of the policy related, are there any other cultural differences or other observations you've had from your reps on the ground and your own experiences abroad?

A Obviously, everywhere we go, we do try to really understand what is the most important things to the customer. And we, we talk about beginning sort of with the end in mind or the working backwards process where we say, what, if we, if we wrote a press release today, what would that look like? And we think about that for every country, every customer. What would we want it to say? And I think you always find, yes, there are some unique things to each organization or country that you go into, but, but at the end of the day, when you get down to the actual technology and the processes, they are very similar. The issues are very similar. The words may be a little different, but they're actually very, very similar, and in fact, just a point on that, we are We are working very hard when we go into these countries to explain to them what's already been put in place with security and compliance regimes, like SOC one, SOC two.

AI assessment note: “when you get down to the actual technology and the processes, they are very similar.”