Build Your Public Sector Practice on AWS – Introducing the AWS Public Sector Program

We have a robust Public Sector customer base on AWS. And there’s an enormous opportunity for AWS Partner Network (APN) firms to build a thriving practice to help Public Sector customers take advantage of AWS. We’d like to help by providing you with the guidance and resources you need, specific to your areas of focus, at every step along your journey on AWS.

To that end, we are excited to announce the launch of the AWS Public Sector Program, which recognizes APN Partners with solutions and experience delivering government, education, and nonprofit customer missions globally.

What is the AWS Public Sector Program?

The AWS Public Sector Program helps you build and accelerate your AWS Public Sector business through alignment with our public sector sales, marketing, partner, and bid teams. Our goal is to help enable you to build a successful business focused on serving public sector customers. We know that you have specific business needs depending on the specific public sector use cases that are your main areas of focus, and we’ve structured the AWS Public Sector Program to be able to provide specific resources, benefits, and guidance in the areas of Government, Education, and Nonprofit.

Every APN Partner’s journey is unique, and there are additional programs within the broader AWS Public Sector Program that we recommend you take advantage of along the way to differentiate your business and areas of expertise to customers. These include the Authorized Government Reseller program, which enables qualified AWS Channel Reseller partners to resell AWS services to public sector end customers; the AWS GovCloud (US) Skill Program, which provides customers with the ability to readily identify APN Partners with experience supporting regulated workloads in the AWS GovCloud (US) Region; and the AWS Government Competency Program, which helps customers connect to vetted APN Partners who provide solutions to—and/or have deep experience working with—government customers to deliver mission-critical workloads and applications on AWS.

In addition to being able to differentiate your firm’s area of expertise through specific programs, there are a number of other benefits you receive as an AWS Public Sector Partner, including the ability to:

• Identify your public sector solution, and receive an ‘Authorized Public Sector Partner’ APN logo
• Feature your company in the APN Partner Solutions Finder as a Government, Education, and/or Nonprofit solution provider to stand out to prospective customers
• Access self-service public sector marketing campaigns to co-brand and promote your AWS solution through APN Marketing Central
• Develop a business plan to expand your public sector customer base and become eligible for additional APN Partner funding benefits
• Build your partnership with our sales, solution architect, marketing, bid and proposal teams to expand your AWS public sector expertise

What value do our launch Public Sector Partners find in being a part of the program? Let’s hear from a few of our launch Partners, SmartSimple (an Advanced APN Technology Partner), Smartronix (a Premier APN Consulting Partner), and Blackboard (an APN Technology Partner), and get their perspectives:

“Working with the AWS team has been a truly collaborative experience. They’ve opened doors for us, shared unique growth opportunities and industry-leading tools” says Mike Reid, Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer of SmartSimple. “Having access to the services of the world’s most trusted cloud service provider has enabled us to offer best-in-class security and technology applications, giving our clients’ peace of mind. AWS has been a great partner, and they’ve been integral to helping us build our brand as we continue to grow. SmartSimple became an AWS Advanced Technology Partner more than 2 years ago. Since then we’ve been awarded statuses as an AWS SaaS Partner, Government Competency Partner, and are now honored to be recognized as a Public Sector Partner.”

 

“Smartronix is privileged to be part of the AWS Public Sector Partner program.  Since 2009, Smartronix has delivered mission critical solutions on AWS for our government customers.  This designation reflects our strong commitment to support the transformation efforts of our Government clients achieving real value in cloud solutions,” says Robert Groat EVP, Technology and Strategy. “AWS has provided foundational technologies that enable our customers to save money, deliver innovative citizen centric services, and achieve the highest levels of security for critical government workloads.”

 

“By joining the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Partner Network (APN), Blackboard is building on an existing strong relationship with AWS that delivers world-class hosting solutions for our clients,” says Katie Blot, Chief Strategy Officer for Blackboard. “In collaboration with AWS, Blackboard is committed to providing educational institutions with tools and resources needed for a complete cloud services and cloud management portfolio—giving them fast, flexible and secure access to our solutions.”

How Can I Join?

Are you ready to get started with the AWS Public Sector Program?

Our goal is to ensure that we’re helping AWS customers connect with Public Sector Partners with proven experience on AWS. What follows are the requirements to join the program and become an official AWS Public Sector Partner.

You must be at the Standard tier or above, have a dedicated public sector practice web page on your website, provide public sector practice customer references, and demonstrate a clear AWS go-to-market plan with partner manager approval.

Read more about the requirements here.

What’s the Impact for Customers?

Customers are now able to easily identify AWS Public Sector Partners by specifically searching APN Partners in the categories of Government, Education, or Nonprofit in the new AWS Partner Solutions Finder. Customers are able to differentiate these partners by their listing in the AWS Public Sector Partner Program, and through their use of the ‘Authorized Public Sector Partner’ logo.

If you’d like to read more about the AWS Public Sector Program launch, visit the AWS Governments, Education, and Nonprofits Blog for a unique perspective about the value of the Program for customers.