4 key predictions to watch for public sector partners in 2023

Partners are playing a key role in the continued digital transformation of public sector organizations. Public sector customers are asking for ways to increase the speed, accessibility, security, and resiliency of their systems and data. As we look forward, here’s what I’m expecting to see for partners supporting public sector customers this year.

1. An increase in solution-oriented tools

Public sector organizations are looking to solve problems quickly and cost effectively. We anticipate that 2023 will see an increase in public sector organizations seeking end-to-end solutions versus an interest in building blocks. Partners are seeing increased customer interest in solutions that support critical public services like traffic, voting, transportation, and waste management. Some Amazon Web Services (AWS) Partners are already making big strides in offering these solutions.

For example, AWS Partner Quantela offers a traffic and lighting solution that helps cities leverage Internet of Things (IoT) to drive efficiencies, reduce operating costs, and perform predictive infrastructure maintenance. One such customer is the city of Coral Gables, Florida. The city has worked with Quantela to develop a comprehensive view of what’s going on in the city, including car, bike, and pedestrian traffic patterns. This has driven efficiencies with predictive maintenance and even helped local businesses better understand foot traffic to drive business.

To help meet the expected increase in demand for end-to-end solutions, AWS has programs available to help partners develop solutions quickly. With Solution Spark, public sector partners can develop open source AWS solutions to support customers across state and local government, federal government, healthcare, and education. Currently available solutions include Service Workbench on AWS, Performance Dashboard on AWS, and Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resource (FHIR) Works.

2. Cybersecurity needs will grow

Over the past several years, we have seen an uptick in headlines related to cybersecurity. High-profile security incidents, ransomware attacks, and the conflict in Ukraine have shown how important it is for public sector customers to secure their infrastructure and data. In response to the evolving threat landscape, many organizations are modernizing infrastructure and adopting technology like cloud computing that can help raise the bar in security and resilience overall.

In 2023 and beyond, partners should be building everything with a strong cybersecurity foundation in mind. One partner delivering resilient and secure cloud solutions is BJSS. The United Kingdom Health Security Agency (UKHSA) worked with BJSS to bring its Test & Trace health services to AWS during the pandemic. With BJSS, UKHSA increased control over their services’ security posture by aggregating logging, secure networking, secure identity, and access management through a single pane of glass on AWS. In less than two months, UKHSA launched a solution that today hosts more than 90 workloads and scales to more than 25,000 users.

We anticipate that security and compliance needs will continue to grow. One way AWS is helping address growing compliance needs is with our Global Security and Compliance Acceleration Program (formerly ATO on AWS). This program helps customers meet their regulatory, security, and compliance requirements on AWS by providing no-cost guidance and access to a community of vetted, expert APN Partners that are poised to support them. Earlier this month, we announced that we now have partners in the program in eight countries around the world.

3. Partners will increase adoption of AI and ML to deliver on mission outcomes

When AWS started our public sector business, customers were primarily attracted to cloud to save money and to create efficiencies by hosting websites and storing data on the cloud. These reasons are still important, but organizations are realizing additional benefits and potential.

Now, public sector organizations are using the cloud for more advanced technologies that drive innovation and greater efficiencies. Many are evaluating and adopting artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technology not as a “nice-to-have,” but for business-critical uses.

One partner making strides in this area is PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), who worked with the European Parliament to build the ArchiBot application. The ArchiBot application gives citizens digital access to 450,000 archived documents and reduces document search time by 80 percent. This tool uses AI algorithms and AWS Lambda for text extraction and document summarization, extracting important information from low-quality documents.

Over the next few years, we predict that nearly every application will be infused with AI and ML. Partners who can incorporate AI and ML into their offerings will be better positioned to help public sector customers achieve their critical missions.

4. Profitability and growth will increase most for partners providing managed services

Public sector customers are increasingly depending on partners to take on more diverse and complex workloads. As cloud use in the public sector grows, partners are able to answer this customer need by layering their capabilities on top of AWS services. AWS believes that as more partners follow this model, and public sector cloud adoption continues this year, this can and will result in better customer experiences and higher partner profitability.

A recently published Canalys study found that a straight resell of AWS native services may yield single digit margins. By adding their own services to AWS services, partners can differentiate themselves and add more value to the customer experience – yielding higher margins. The report found that the largest returns came to partners who are delivering business outcomes to customers.

One partner delivering on this model is Accenture with their Intelligent Public Safety platform, designed to drive insights for public safety customers – from complex investigations to supporting the well-being of staff. For example, for first responders, the Intelligent Public Safety platform can provide real-time updates to keep responders informed about their missions, as well as information about actions they should be ready to take so they can protect citizens safely. Additionally, by using the newly-launched Velocity platform, Accenture can further reduce customers’ time to mission outcomes.

Looking ahead

Partners have an incredible role to play in the public sector and we don’t see this slowing down in 2023. By leveraging cloud, partners can help public sector organizations deliver more personalized and efficient citizen services, enhance their cybersecurity, and help them deliver on their critical missions.

Learn more about how AWS supports public sector organizations at the AWS in the Public Sector main page.

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