Category Archives: Cloud Computing
Achieving Resilient Cloud Broadcasting with Amagi CLOUDPORT on AWS | Amazon Web Services – AWS Blog
By Aript Malani, Engineering manager Amagi By Bharath S, Sr. Partner Solutions Architect AWS By Raghu Mukund, Strategic Account Manager AWS By Girish B, Sr. Solutions Architect AWS
Broadcasters must plan for events outside of their control, such as natural disasters and broad infrastructure outages, so mitigating the risk of degraded viewing experiences and revenue losses at high-profile events is critical.
Amagi has a customer-focused approach driven by business requirements to achieve different levels of playout service resiliency on Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Amagi is a market leader in cloud broadcast and streaming TV technology, with over 2,000 channels deployed in over 40 countries. The core of Amagis offerings is CLOUDPORT, a cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) playout platform that delivers broadcast-grade quality while offering the flexibility of cloud deployment.
Amagi is an AWS Specialization Partner and AWS Marketplace Seller that offers cloud broadcast and targeted ad solutions to broadcast TV and streaming TV platforms.
Amagi fulfills diverse customer requirements for redundancy and recovery time by using AWS resiliency options that leverage multiple AWS Availability Zones (AZs) over single/multiple regions. The deployment options range from deployment of playout and automation in a single AZ to minimize cost and complexity, to multi-region that provides geo-level resilience for critical events.
For customers with the highest redundancy and resiliency requirements, Amagi provides a beyond multi-region option that offers on-premises automation and playout in addition to multi-AZ/multi-region deployments.
Figure 1 Amagis tiered resiliency offerings.
In addition to playout and automation deployments spanning single or multiple AZs/regions, the configurations can be hot, warm, or cold depending on desired recovery times.
Customers select a configuration based on their business requirements. If the focus is signal recovery at a highly optimized cost, Amagi offers a pre-built cached playout chain to provide quick service recovery in the event of a catastrophic event.
Amagis distributed architecture achieves an instant recovery of the control plane with sub-one minute recovery time objective (RTO) in multi-AZ option and recovery time objective (RTO) of 10 minutes for regional failover across multi-region respectively. This ensures playout continuity during outages with quick control plane recovery.
Amagi CLOUDPORT is a versatile playout platform that supports most industry-standard audio, video, and subtitle formats. It provides an intuitive interface with asset management, analytics, and configurable rules.
Key features include automation for scheduling, quality control, and monitoring; multi-layered graphics support; and a wide range of input formats like MXF, MOV, MPG, TS, and output formats including MPEG-TS, HLS, SRT, Zixi, NDI, and RIST. The platform handles video codecs AVC and HEVC; audio codecs AAC, AC3, and EAC3; as well as captions in CC-608, CC-708, DVB subs, and DVB teletext.
Figure 2 Amagi playout multi-region architecture.
In the diagram above, the secondary region does not actively generate service 247. It remains in a warm (standby) state, prepared to take over transmission if issues arise in the primary region. If a switch from the primary to the secondary region is necessary, it is automatic through Amazon CloudFront, ensuring a seamless and swift transition and allowing uninterrupted service availability.
Amagis CLOUDPORT SaaS platform is built on AWS services with built-in support for multi-AZ, allowing for quick and seamless switching between availability zones.
Video transport relies on AWS Elemental Media Services like AWS Elemental MediaLive, AWS Elemental MediaConnect, AWS Elemental MediaPackage, and AWS Elemental MediaStore. These services can withstand failures at the AZ level, and the business functionalities are based on a microservices architecture running on Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS).
Further, the systems components are configured as microservices to enable dynamic scaling to meet specific customer requirements. CLOUDPORT is deployed and managed on a self-managed EKS cluster, offering maximum configuration flexibility.
Various aspects (such as database, caching, media storage, and archival) rely on managed services like Amazon Aurora, Amazon ElastiCache, and Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3). Multi-region networking enables communication between EKS pods and services across regions through virtual private cloud (VPC) peering.
Amazon EKSs use of a VPC container network interface (CNI)enables IP communication between pods in different regions. Amazon Route 53s public and private hosted zones are key for domain name service (DNS)-based services and endpoints across regions. Route 53 readiness checks allow swift failover during region impairments, while failback strategies ensure service restoration post-disaster.
CLOUDPORT playout receives media feeds from customers to offer playout services using their media asset management and source systems. It receives live content from AWS Elemental MediaConnect for secure, low-latency transmission using AWS Direct Connect.
Content integration systems upload content and schedules from on-premises storage to Amazon S3, which stores petabytes of video assets crucial for channel playout, while S3 Multi-Region Access Pointallows access to input files from multiple regions for redundancy.
Playout services automatically retrieve and process data from S3 for transcoding. Inputs include various video files that undergo verification and completeness checks, with issues notified via Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS). Processed media assets are stored in a transmission-ready S3 bucket.
Amazon Aurora Global Database is utilized to ensure high availability and data redundancy across regions. It replicates data across multiple regions and enables global access and failover capabilities. If theres an outage in the primary region, it can automatically promote a cross-region replica to become an independent cluster that serves as the new primary database.
When a failover occurs, a DNS switchover updates the endpoint so applications can seamlessly connect to the newly-provisioned primary cluster in the alternate region. This ensures uninterrupted data access and application functionality during an outage.
Once the primary region is stable again, a planned failover reverts the architecture back to original state. Aurora Global Database enables smooth cross-region reader deployment so applications can read from replicas in different regions, improving read scalability and minimizing load on the primary database.
Amazon ElastiCache Global Datastore provides a distributed, in-memory caching solution with automatic failover between regions for disaster recovery (DR). In the event of a disaster affecting the primary region, the secondary cluster becomes the primary, ensuring a seamless transition of workload and data access to minimize application disruption.
Once the primary region recovers and syncs, it returns to a secondary role as a read replica or cache node. This dynamic capability allows the architecture to adapt to changing circumstances and ensures highly available data access across regions, even in the face of unexpected disasters.
The CLOUDPORT Switcher microservice allows for seamless, frame-accurate video switching to AWS Elemental MediaLive, which writes content to MediaStore or S3. These services originate content for Amazon CloudFront, providing primary and failover CDN paths for continuous video delivery across regions.
Amagi LIVE utilizes redundant contribution streams through separate MediaConnect direct connects to ensure network fault tolerance. MediaConnect streams are sent to multiple receive locations over separate direct connects, enhancing redundancy. This architecture withstands regional failures, ensuring reliable video delivery.
After integrating all components, pods interconnect with storage services in the primary us-east-1 region. To ensure redundancy, these storage services duplicate across the secondary us-west-1 region.
In a regional failure event, the secondary storage services promote to take over, so the control and video path continue without interruption despite the outage. This demonstrates failback reverting changes, returning the system to its initial state after regional failure. This swift recovery design maintains full operational capability, safeguarding service continuity and minimizing downtime.
In the event of a failover, the specific actions required by CLOUDPORT depend on the chosen failover solution. In a hot configuration with no traffic option, the connection to the headend will be established. In warm or cold modes, missing instances start automatically and when the configuration completes the service resumes.
Users can also initiate a manual failover using the WebUI module. This triggers the CLOUDPORT re-configuration process and activates the instances. Alternatively, the CLOUDPORT API can trigger failover after an integration with the customers end-to-end monitoring and control systems. This offers flexibility in implementing failover strategies that best suit the specific requirements and preferences of the customer.
Before commissioning the playout solution, CLOUDPORT undergoes exhaustive tuning and testing. Tuning involves verifying settings in a realistic scenario, adapting input formats and downlinks to the available network capacity and quality of service, optimizing Kubernetes clusters and Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instance types for the channel types and numbers.
Testing involves selecting and validating the failover options against the customers requirements. Testing includes end-to-end functionality and video quality tests, verification of content upload and verification mechanisms, schedule amendment tests, and verification of program reuse from cloud archives. Failover and failback scenarios are tested and validated against functional and non-functional requirements like RTO/RPO.
For a robust disaster recovery solution, defining regular testing plans is crucial to ensure the DR mechanism remains reliable over the life of the service. To achieve this, CLOUDPORT utilizes a separate test endpoint and the test version of the failure reconfiguration AWS Lambda function. It conducts regular, pre-defined DR drills to validate the strategy and identify weaknesses and areas for improvement to enhance DR preparedness. Periodic testing of the failover mechanism is critical to ensure effectiveness, especially in the case of on-premises architecture modifications.
Information gathered from the tuning and testing phase helps define options and configurations based on program audience and business impact in the event of a failure. This can be a per-channel customization with the hot option used for critical channels, and warm or cold options configured for niche channels.
Ensuring alignment and compatibility with the source, on-premises system, and communication endpoints is crucial to a successful recovery strategy in case of a disaster.
The approach highlighted in this post presents a straightforward and efficient architecture for implementing a cloud-based disaster recovery solution for channel playout on AWS.
By utilizing Amagis CLOUDPORT SaaS product and an integration system, this solution supports hybrid operations and offers various configuration options to strike the optimal balance between RTO/RPO and operational costs. Emphasizing the significance of operational procedures and regular failover testing, CLOUDPORT ensures its reliability and functionality when required.
You can learn more about Amagi CLOUDPORT on AWS Marketplace.
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Amagi is an AWS Specialization Partner that offers cloud broadcast and targeted ad solutions to broadcast TV and streaming TV platforms.
Contact Amagi | Partner Overview | AWS Marketplace
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Achieving Resilient Cloud Broadcasting with Amagi CLOUDPORT on AWS | Amazon Web Services - AWS Blog
The egress fee exit – DCD – DatacenterDynamics
Hyperscalers may be complying with the EU Data Act, but does it go far enough?
This year has seen the big three public cloud providers ditching their data egress fees for customers exiting the cloud. A monumental move - paradigm shifting even? Well, no. But it does meet the bare minimum of upcoming standards and regulations.
The issue of competition and vendor lock-in with cloud providers has been ongoing. Over the last few years, we have seen Microsoft be the target of an antitrust campaign, led by OVHcloud and backed by cloud trade association CISPE. Among CISPE's members is AWS, another of the key cloud providers. Later that year, Microsoft adjusted the terms of its cloud computing service to avoid a full investigation.
Just one year later, however, Google accused Microsoft and Oracle of anti-competitive practices in a letter to the Federal Trade Commission, and around the same time, Oracle accused AWS of similar practices.
Finding the right home for your workload
13 Mar 2024
The issue has, in some ways, begun to feel like a playground spat. A "who hit who first." Isn't the point that everyone is hitting everyone?
Towards the end of last year the UK's Competition and Markets Authority officially launched an investigation into the competitive practices of the cloud computing sector based on a recommendation from communications regulator Ofcom.
The pressure was beginning to build in the cloud computing pot, and perhaps the final blow was the announcement of the EU Data Act, which came into force on January 11, 2024.
The act requires public and private cloud computing service providers to remove "obstacles to effective switching" between their own and competing cloud services, including commercial, contractual, technical, or organizational hurdles.
This includes common deterrents such as egress fees.
Google was the first of the cloud providers to make a move, announcing the removal of egress fees on the very same day the Data Act was established. A blog post from Amit Zavery, head of platform at Google Cloud, condemned the "restrictive and unfair licensing practices" that are a fundamental issue and that "certain legacy providers" leverage their software monopolies to create cloud monopolies that "lock in customers and warp competition."
According to Google's requirements, customers must fully exit the cloud platform and do so in 60 days.
AWS was next, taking the leap in on March 5, 2024. This announcement was slightly different, in that customers do not seem to have to completely sever ties with AWS, but they must be fully leaving a particular service or product behind. A week or so later, Microsoft followed suit, taking a similar stance as Google.
In a recent feature, DCD spoke to several players about what these announcements actually mean. The consensus seemed to vary between a "step in the right direction" to others arguing that the cloud providers are doing "something which has absolutely no meaning to 99.9 percent of their customers but satisfies the government."
The reason is that the issue isn't customers wanting to leave these cloud providers, it is the day-to-day charges that add up dramatically as customers use their services.
Corey Quinn of The Duckbill Group told DCD: "It's the ebb and flow of conducting business, while happily remaining AWS customers, that gets expensive. There's a reason that Netflix still has its entire own home-built content delivery network. They don't stream any of their movies out of AWS because even at their scale, the cost would be ruinous."
There is an inherent cost for moving data on the Internet, but the profitability margin that egress charges enable is significant. Vultr, a cloud provider that does not charge for data transfers, told DCD that they have cut prices on core services that mirror those of the major hyperscalers, and remain "wildly profitable."
While you might think that now all three of the cloud providers have made this move, the playground bickering would come to an end. It hasn't.
In AWS's announcement, the company argued "The biggest barrier to changing cloud providers continues to be unfair software licensing. Some IT providers impose licensing restrictions on their software that make it financially unworkable for their customers to choose a cloud provider other than them," reiterating that which Zavery said in the Google announcement.
Following the Microsoft announcement, Zavery tweeted: "Microsoft's decision to stop charging its customers exit fees is a step in the right direction. But to really support customer choice, it's time to address the greatest barrier: MSFT's restrictive and predator licensing that forces customers into Azure."
Perhaps notably, Microsoft did not address licensing issues in its announcement at all.
For a more in-depth look at the announcement and competition within the cloud computing sector, read the latest Cloud & Hybrid Supplement.
Oracle Adds New GenAI Features to Cloud Applications and Expands Microsoft Partnership – Investopedia
Key Takeaways
Oracle (ORCL)announced new artificial intelligence (AI) features integrated into its cloud application systems and an expansion of the regions where it offers Oracle Database@Azure in partnership with Microsoft (MSFT) on Thursday.
With the new generative AI (GenAI) capabilities, businesses using the Oracle Fusion Cloud Applications Suite can leverage AI to "help customers improve decision making and enhance the employee and customer experience," Oracle said in a release.
The Oracle Fusion Cloud Applications Suite provides enterprise customers with the company's software as a service (SaaS) applications with AI tech integrated.
The new features are built on Oracle cloud infrastructure and support "over 50 generative AI use cases that are embedded within Oracle Fusion Applications and designed to respect customers enterprise data, privacy, and security."
We have been using AI in our applications for several years and now we are introducing more ways for customers to take advantage of generative AI across the suite," Oracle Executive Vice President of Applications Development Steve Miranda said.
The company also announced that Oracle Database@Azure would be expanding the regions in which it offers the Oracle and Microsoft collaboration.
Customers can now place orders for Oracle Database@Azure in Frankfurt, Germany, in the debut of Oracle Database@Azure in Europe.
The company added that in order "to meet the growing customer demand this year, the service will further run in the Australia East, Brazil South, Canada Central, France Central, Central India, Italy North, Japan East, Southeast Asia, Sweden Central, United Kingdom South, Central United States, South Central United States, and United Arab Emirates North cloud regions."
Cloud products and services represent a large portion of Oracle's revenue. In the third quarter of fiscal 2024, cloud services and licenses drove $32.39 billion in revenue, 83% of the company's total revenue for the quarter.
Oracle shares were little changed Thursday trading at $125.52as of 3:15 p.m. ET Thursday. In the past year, the stock has gained nearly 50%.
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Oracle Adds New GenAI Features to Cloud Applications and Expands Microsoft Partnership - Investopedia
MAXHUB to Build Advanced AI Solutions with Microsoft Azure Cloud to Drive Global Business Growth USA – English – PR Newswire
GUANGZHOU, China, March 14, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- MAXHUB, a leading provider of collaborative communication and interactive display solutions, proudly announces it will integrate Microsoft Azure technology. MAXHUB will harness the power of Azure to significantly amplify its international business growth and further AI technology advancements.
Amidst expanding global business horizons, MAXHUB integrates with Microsoft Azure to empower itself by meeting the surging needs for scalable cloud computing and storage. MAXHUB seamlessly shares data across multiple global data centers using the robust capabilities of Azure Cosmos DB and Blob Storage. By segregating foundational business data from personal privacy data and integrating with Azure Kubernetes Services, MAXHUB have established a globally distributed architecture for deploying key services like OTA (Over-The-Air) andCMS (Content management system). This setup is tailored for MAXHUB operational management within a worldwide scope. Not only does this enhance the research and operational efficiency, but it also effectively aligns with the data compliance regulations of various regions.
MAXHUB's integration of Azure services will support its global business and drive it forward, helping users move into a new era of more efficient and high-quality service experiences. In addition, this move will promote MAXHUB's innovative development in the field of artificial intelligence, which in turn will enhance user's interactive experience with smarter and more comprehensive technology solutions.
"We are preparing to harness Azure OpenAI features to explore AI applications in education. Our aim is to assist teachers in lesson planning and curriculum evaluation by integrating AI capabilities." Said DavidMeng, President of Global Business Group atMAXHUB. "Our objective is to nurture a high efficient and intelligent ecosystem where creativity flourishes into meaningful human interactions. Microsoft Azure's offerings align strategically with our vision and will establish a solid foundation for our success in global markets."
At present, the global demand for cloud computing and AI services is growing. MAXHUB's application and exploration of Microsoft Azure will provide users with a solid technical foundation and empower businesses with cutting-edge technology. "Microsoft is committed to empowering our customers and partners with supreme solutions that drive productivity and enrich collaborative experiences." Said Min ZHENG, Vice President of Microsoft China.
For further details, kindly explore MAXHUB's and Microsoft's websites.
About MAXHUB
MAXHUB is an industry leader in smart displays and audiovisual technology, focusing on communication and collaboration. As an R&D-led organization, they develop a range of industry-leading solutions that help keep people seamlessly connected and make teamwork more efficient and effective.
For more information about the MAXHUB, visit http://www.maxhub.com.
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Industry clouds give CIOs on-ramp to gen AI – CIO
While seemingly providing commoditized feature sets, industry clouds have been proving their business value in part by laying the foundation for innovation at companies across a range of industries. Going vertical with cloud solutions gives many companies advantages they would not have had otherwise, analysts say, including a quicker route to the cloud and purpose-built features that cater to their specific needs.
For RBC, theyre utilizing key capabilities like client interaction, information and data management, and Slack alongside as acommunication platform that facilitates collaboration and information sharing within RBC Wealth and externallywith clients, says David Mario Smith, founder and principal analyst of Inflow Analysis.
And, with access to features such as Einstein, CIOs choosing industry clouds may be able to accelerate innovation further.
Salesforce, which launched its first industry offering Financial Services Cloud in 2016, boasts 14 industry clouds developed in close partnership with industry experts and leading customers to provide industry-specific functionality, data models, and applications, says Jeff Amann, EVP and GM of Salesforce Industries, who co-founded industry cloud pioneer Vlocity, which Salesforce acquired in 2020.
The company, which generates roughly $5 billion in revenue from its industry cloud offerings, claims that 45% of its industry cloud customers are new to Salesforce, and it competes against the likes of Oracle, SAP, and ServiceNow across a growing range of verticals, along with hyperscalers AWS, Microsoft, and Google.
IDC analyst Nadia Ballard says enterprise software vendors such as Salesforce were the leading vertical cloud providers in 2022 but lost some share in 2023 to large cloud service providers, which have boosted their industry-specific offerings and financial incentives to existing cloud customers. SaaS vendors ended up in second place, with 41% of respondents to IDCs Industry Cloud Path 2023 survey saying they use an industry cloud from an enterprise software vendor, Ballard says.
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Industry clouds give CIOs on-ramp to gen AI - CIO
1 Little-Known Cloud Computing Stock to Buy Hand Over Fist Before It Soars 43% – sharewise
DigitalOcean Holdings (NYSE: DOCN) may not be a popular name in the cloud computing space when compared to the likes of and Amazon, and that's not surprising as it is currently in its early phases of growth.
Founded in 2012, DigitalOcean isn't a cloud service provider in the mold of its more illustrious peers. The company is known for providing an on-demand cloud computing platform that's used by small businesses, developers, and start-ups, and it has been struggling in the past year because of weak cloud spending. This explains why DigitalOcean stock has gained just 15% in the past year, which is well below the Nasdaq Composite index's 42% gains.
However, a closer look at the company's prospects and its attractive valuation suggests that it could indeed step on the gas in the future. Let's see why that may be the case.
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1 Little-Known Cloud Computing Stock to Buy Hand Over Fist Before It Soars 43% - sharewise
Webinar: Discover The Anatomy of Cloud Computing in 2024 – Simplilearn
Unlock the Power of Cloud Computing: A Gateway to Future-Proof Your Career.
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Under the expert guidance of Purshottam J Assudani, a luminary in cloud computing and digital transformation with decades of experience, this webinar will unfold the vast expanse of cloud technologies. Our host, with his extensive background in leading cloud initiatives, will share insights that bridge theoretical knowledge with practical application.
Who Should Attend?
This webinar is meticulously crafted for a broad audience, ranging from IT professionals to business leaders who aspire to leverage cloud computing for organizational growth and personal career advancement. It is particularly beneficial for:
Why You Can't-Miss This Webinar
Embarking on this learning journey with us will empower you with:
What You Will Learn :
This engaging and interactive webinar will cover foundational to advanced topics in cloud computing, ensuring you walk away with a comprehensive understanding of:
Bonus: Caltech PGP Cloud Computing Preview
This webinar segment will provide a deep dive into the features and benefits of the Post Graduate Program in Cloud Computing in collaboration with Caltech CTME.
Highlights include:
Join us to navigate the cloud computing landscape with confidence and clarity. This webinar is your stepping stone to becoming integral to the cloud computing revolution. Secure your spot today and take the first step towards a future-proof career in cloud computing.
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Webinar: Discover The Anatomy of Cloud Computing in 2024 - Simplilearn
Event Recap – AWS Blog
Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2024 welcomed over 100,000 attendees, 2,700+ exhibitors, sponsors and partners, and 1,100 speakers and thought leaders, to explore industry topics including AI, monetization opportunities, and the transformative power of the cloud for telcos.
This event is about providing a glimpse into the future and demonstrating how AI, 5G and APIs are unlocking new possibilities, thanks to collaborative initiatives like GSMA Open Gateway, said Mats Granryd, director general at GSMA.
AWS shared a number of customer and partner announcements across generative AI, network APIs, 5G, and network transformation. Attendees also saw firsthand how AWS innovations can transform telcos, digitize industries, and reimagine consumer experiences through the 20+ demos at the AWS next level. Watch the AWS next level recap video.
Here are a few highlights from AWS at MWC 2024.
Telcos are looking to artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and generative AI to streamline costs and efficiencies, enable better customer engagement, and drive innovative new offerings. With enterprise-grade security and privacy, a choice of leading foundation models, a data-first approach, and the most performant, low-cost infrastructure, telcos trust AWS to deliver everything they need to accelerate generative AI powered innovation.
At MWC 2024, there were more 40 sessions that focused on AI, with many noting that generative AI is on the verge of transforming the way we live, work, and interact. BT Group announced that it deployed Amazon Qs coding companion (Amazon CodeWhisperer) to provide generative AI coding assistance to its software engineers. The solution is already providing 15-20 suggestions of code per active user per day for BT Group, with an acceptance rate of 37% by its software engineers who are using the platform. This is a great example of the value, efficiency, and support generative AI can offer.
Tele2 announced it is using AWS to launch an Internet of Things (IoT) customer support solution, powered by Amazon Bedrock. The solution is designed using AWS services and will help Tele2 IoT customer support agents to provide faster and more detailed conversational responses to IoT customer inquiries across multiple channels.
Central to the shift of telecom operators into future-ready organizations is the embrace of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). McKinsey estimated the network API market could unlock around $100-300 billion in revenue for operators over the next 5-7 years, stemming from connectivity and edge computing, while generating an additional $10-30 billion from APIs themselves. The GSMA Open Gateway initiative was announced at MWC 2023 with the support of 21 mobile network operators and cloud providers, including AWS. Since then, Open Gateway has expanded to 47 operators, attracting developers to build innovative use cases and applications, using APIs that expose unique characteristics of the networks.
In the run up to MWC 2024, AWS announced it is working alongside global telcos including Verizon, Telefnica, T-Mobile, Orange, and Liberty Global, to offer telco network APIs to AWS developers. These developers already use thousands of AWS APIs from over 240 AWS services, and they can access telco network APIs to reach more developers and customers through AWS Marketplace. We have AWS applications in financial services, gaming, and immersive experiences being built using telco APIs, and will be adding more operators globally, as we get adoption.
5G Future Forum (5GFF) members, including Telstra, Verizon, Vodafone, Rogers, America Movil, KT, and Bell Canada, in collaboration with AWS, released a whitepaper defining the role of bi-directional APIs between telco and cloud providers in advancing multi-edge computing (MEC) infrastructure integration and applications.
Vonage announced a collaboration with AWS to accelerate the availability of new solutions, with an anti-fraud solution as the first one. AWS generative AI services will enhance the solutions fraud detection capabilities, enabling businesses to better protect themselves from mobile fraud while improving the customer experience.
Telcos across the world are leveraging cloud to transform their networks so they can take advantage of the clouds economics, scale, and agility. This allows them to focus on whats most important transforming telcos core networks, monetizing their investments, digitizing industries, reimagining the consumer experience, and increasing resilience and security.
NTT DOCOMO, Japans leading mobile operator with more than 89 million subscribers, selected AWS to commercially deploy its nationwide 5G Open Radio Access Network (RAN) in Japan. DOCOMO will use AWS to deploy Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service Anywhere, a container management software, at its 5G Open RAN to simplify network operations with automated cluster management tools. AWS is supporting NTT DOCOMO in developing its 5G Core on AWS that is running in a hybrid cloud environment.
TELUS announced a new collaboration with Samsung Electronics and AWS that will see Telus become the first telecommunications provider in North America to evolve the architecture of roaming, enabling greater reliability and faster speeds for customers traveling abroad. Meanwhile, in Europe, Swiss telecom operator Sunrise Business announced it is working with AWS to accelerate the cloudification of Swiss small to medium-sized enterprises.
In Latin America, Beyond ONE/Virgin Mobile announced it is working with AWS to drive growth and innovation in the regions telecommunications sector. Virgin Mobile will use a combination of AWS Regions and AWS hybrid cloud offeringsincluding AWS Outposts and AWS Local Zonesto modernize the Beyond One stack and mark a significant step forward in cloud adoption and digital transformation in the region.
Read more about our other announcements below.
AWS promotes diversity in technology and supports organizations empowering women to pursue tech careers. According to GSMA, MWC 2024 attracted 26% of female attendees, and of the 1,100 speakers, 40% of them were female. This year, AWS hosted a panel discussion on opportunities and challenges women in the telecom industry face and reinforced our commitment to diversity across the telecom ecosystem during our AWS executive reception.
At MWC 2024, AWS showcased 20+ demos across three main themes:
1/ Transforming Telcos These demos focused on the network cloudification journey of CSPs (across RAN, Core, IMS and OSS/BSS) through unified automation, orchestration and generative AI toolchain, resulting in new growth opportunities, reduced OPEX, increased sustainability, and enhanced resiliency. Watch the recap:
2/ Digitizing industries Innovative industry use cases in this demo area showcased how AWS is supporting leading telcos to help digitize industries like healthcare, manufacturing, travel and hospitality, and financial services. This is done through reinventing connectivity and introducing new business models (via private network solutions, network APIs, public MEC, etc.). Watch the recap:
3/ Reimagining consumer experience The demos in this area showcased some of the innovative solutions AWS is developing with telcos and leading ISVs to engage consumers in a more exciting, personalized, and smart way.
Did you attend MWC 2024? Leave your top telco takeaways and predictions for 2024 in the comments section of this post. Follow AWS for Telecom to see highlights from the event this year and to stay up to date with our latest news.
See you at Mobile World Congress 2025!
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Event Recap - AWS Blog
AWS to invest $5.3 to build data centers in Saudi Arabia to bolster tech in the region – CIO
Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the latest high-tech giant to announce a major stake in Saudi Arabias burgeoning technology industry, unveiling a plan this week to invest more than $5.3 billion in the Middle East kingdom to build data centers and a significant cloud presence in the region.
Specifically, AWS will launch what its calling an AWS infrastructure Region in Saudi Arabia in 2026 to give technology developers, existing businesses, and startups and entrepreneurs a comprehensive, in-country data-center infrastructure for running their cloud-based technology solutions, according to a release by Amazons cloud unit.
The new AWS Region will enable organizations to unlock the full potential of the cloud and build with AWS technologies like compute, storage, databases, analytics, and artificial intelligence, transforming the way businesses and institutions serve their customers, said Prasad Kalyanaraman, vice president of infrastructure services at AWS, in a press statement.
AWS will join competitors Huawei, Microsoft, and Oracle in launching significantly funded plans to build cloud infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, bolstering the countrys plans to become a technology hub for the Middle East. Indeed, the kingdom is positioning itself as a global leader in digital technologies ahead of its hosting of the World Expo 2030 in Riyadh.
Amazons investment in the kingdom aims to fortify this strategy with the highest levels of security and resilience available on AWS cloud infrastructure, helping serve fast-growing demand for cloud services across the Middle East, Kalyanaraman said.
The move likely was spurred not only by an interest in ensuring it stays on pace with competitors in a fast-growing global market, but also by pressure on foreign firms applied last year by Saudi Arabia to move operations to the country or risk losing government contracts. Amazon alongside its US-based cloud competitors Google and Microsoft acted quickly to set up regional headquarters in Saudi Arabia.
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AWS to invest $5.3 to build data centers in Saudi Arabia to bolster tech in the region - CIO
Amazon EC2 R7i instances are now available in additional AWS region – AWS Blog
Starting today, Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) R7i instances are available in Europe(Paris).
Amazon EC2 R7i instances are powered by custom 4th Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processors (code-named Sapphire Rapids), available only on AWS, offer up to 15% better performance over comparable x86-based Intel processors utilized by other cloud providers.
They deliver up to 15% better price-performance versus R6i instances. These instances are SAP certified and are a great choice for memory-intensive workloads, such as SAP, SQL and NoSQL databases, distributed web scale in-memory caches, in-memory databases like SAP HANA, and real time big data analytics like Hadoop and Spark. They offer larger instance sizes, up to 48xlarge, and two bare metal sizes (metal-24xl, metal-48xl) for high-transaction and latency-sensitive workloads. These bare-metal sizes support built-in Intel accelerators: Data Streaming Accelerator, In-Memory Analytics Accelerator, and QuickAssist Technology, allowing customers to facilitate efficient offload and acceleration of data operations and optimize performance for workloads.
R7i instances support the new Intel Advanced Matrix Extensions (AMX) that accelerate matrix multiplication operations for applications such as CPU-based ML. In addition, customers can now attach up to 128 EBS volumes to an R7i instance (vs 28 EBS volume attachments on R6i). This allows processing of larger amounts of data, scale workloads, and improve performance over R6i instances.
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Amazon EC2 R7i instances are now available in additional AWS region - AWS Blog