What is our primary use case?
Our clients are the users. We recommend AWS to most of our clients, from the UK government, a shipping company in London, to companies in Washington and Sydney. We maintain their infrastructure on AWS.
We are not partners with AWS. We create and maintain the client's accounts, but the ownership remains with the clients. They pay directly for the AWS services, while we are the administrators who maintain their infrastructure.
AWS offers a lot of services; it's basically all microservices. As the client grows, we scale up to different data centers, security systems, and servers at different levels. We gradually migrate their emails, text messages, and everything else into the AWS infrastructure.
What is most valuable?
There's something called EC2, which are application servers. They are automatically scalable. They can increase, for example, during peak times like Christmas, depending on the load, and then decrease so the customer doesn't pay a huge amount. It's only during peak times that they automatically increase and then decrease. That's one of the best features of AWS.
Moreover, many Amazon products provide built-in firewalls and security features, eliminating the need for external security solutions.
What needs improvement?
One thing that's a bit different is that we're still accustomed to speaking to someone directly. AWS doesn't offer that kind of support. It's only through bots. You're speaking to chatbots, and that can sometimes be frustrating because there's no person on the other side. AI is not a substitute for a person.
AWS marketplace is very strong, but somehow AWS doesn't promote it much. They have a huge customer base across the globe, and if products were launched in their marketplace, they could sell like hotcakes. They should improve their marketplace and promote the same product across the globe. They can take a cut, but they should promote it. That's something they don't do very much.
So, AWS should promote its marketplace software. The company should promote it aggressively. Currently, they keep it very subtle. If you ask for it, they'll help you out. But they don't seem to advertise, "You're building a product on our platform? Why don't you sell it in our marketplace?"
Improvement in AI:
AWS is a little behind Microsoft Azure in terms of AI. AWS is still getting there, but the kind of examples and help files available in Azure for AI are much better. So AWS still needs to work on its AI functionality.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using it for nine years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's very stable. Some banks are even moving in now. It has 24/7 uptime, which gives 99.97% uptime. That's really good service.
I would rate the stability a nine out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We create configurable systems that can keep scaling up and creating new servers on the fly. Then, they scale down when there's no load. For instance, if a server's load increases to 80%, we immediately create a new server automatically.
During peak times, like Christmas, we might increase to seven or eight servers. As soon as the peak time is over, we reduce it back to one server, so the customer doesn't pay for eight servers. So it's very flexible.
It's an eleven out of ten. AWS is the best. We mostly work with enterprise businesses, but there are a few startups that begin with AWS because of the free credits. But those are smaller customers. 40% are smaller customers. And some of those who were smaller customers around eight or ten years ago have become enterprise-class today.
How are customer service and support?
AI bot solves most problems, but we still need a human being to interact with, so I would rate it at six.
How would you rate customer service and support?
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is very easy. The deployment takes half an hour.
The initial setup experience with Amazon AWS was easy for us. We've been doing this for the last nineteen years, so it's become a piece of cake. It takes hardly half an hour to set up the whole infrastructure initially for any new clients.
So, I would rate my experience with the initial setup a ten out of ten.
What about the implementation team?
My clients are the customers of AWS. We are the ones maintaining their infrastructure.
What was our ROI?
There is ROI. It provides free cloud services for a specific duration and for specific customizations. Most clients get onboard and receive free credits, which they can use for two or six months.
That's something very good with AWS because people can try it out without having to pay immediately. That's one of the best features, where everyone starts thinking about payment after their product is rolled out and they start making money.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing is reasonable. It's not expensive, nor will it be cheap, but the free credits initially given provide leverage for new companies to start their businesses.
I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten, with ten being expensive.
It becomes expensive if people want to use a lot of AI because that requires a lot of processing. If it's not optimized, it can become quite expensive.
For a startup, it starts with $500 to $1,000, but eventually, it reaches between $10,000 to $15,000 on average per month.
What other advice do I have?
The best part of AWS when starting up is to take the fixed rate and start using it. As you go along, slowly increase the expenses and ask for a little more free credit, as they do extend it.
AWS does this very nicely. And even for the UK, if you have the right skill set, you can make it economical. But if you misuse it, then it becomes very expensive.
Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten.
