Category: Customer Solutions

Latin America is set to achieve gender parity in 69 years, according to the latest World Economic Forum (WEF)’s Global Gender Gap Report. The same report shows that women experience a bigger gender gap in fast-growing fields like cloud computing, where women represent 25% or below of the workforce. At AWS, we believe that to address this challenge, we must give individuals around the world, from all backgrounds, the opportunity to develop cloud skills and begin promising careers in technology. Learn more about the AWS Habilidades Tech program and our collaboration on the Organization of American States (OAS) Cyberwomen Challenge.

Moneythink is an education technology nonprofit providing big solutions to help with college affordability, accessibility, and student loan debt. We built DecidED, a web app that runs on AWS and provides students across the country with guidance and support to understand financial aid options and budgeting for college costs. Our work gives students the cost transparency necessary to make clear decisions about their futures, and is especially beneficial for historically marginalized students, as they often lack resources due to institutionally imposed barriers.

The theme of this year’s Earth Day is “Invest in our planet.” In celebration of this year’s theme, we want to highlight the important sustainability work featured in the AWS documentary series, Climate Next, which explores the ways organizations and communities in four distinct regions are investing in cloud-powered solutions to fight climate change.

Open data is helping researchers and nonprofit conservationists protect vulnerable species around the world. In celebration of Earth Day, we are shining a spotlight on two sustainability stories from the AWS Fix This podcast from AWS, a podcast exploring the ways people use technology to address some of the world’s most pressing challenges.

The Materials Project at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) is an open database that offers information about material properties, or, all the elements and substances that make up the products we use every day. By harnessing the power of the Department of Energy’s (DOE) high-performance scientific computing and state of the art electronic structure methods, the Materials Project provides open web-based access on AWS to computational datasets on both known and potential materials, along with powerful analysis tools to help discover, inspire, and design new materials.

Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB), also known as the Western Launch and Test Range, is one of only two U.S. Space Force launch ranges. A safe rocket launch relies on the ability of Western Range meteorologists to gather and analyze weather data in real-time. The Western Range team wanted to switch to an agile, cloud-based solution that would streamline data analysis and keep operators safe—which prompted them to call on students and AWS Cloud experts at the California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) Digital Transformation Hub (DxHub), powered by AWS, to help VSFB prototype a solution.

At The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association (Guide Dogs), we provide a variety of services and support to anyone affected by sight loss, their friends, and their family. Our mission is to give them access to information and support to make a positive impact on their well-being, self-confidence, self-esteem and ability to function with loss of sight. Voice assistants powered by AWS allow our organization to support our communities and enrich their quality of life.

As part of the Amazon Sustainability Data Initiative (ASDI), AWS invited Rafael Monge Vargas, director of the National Center of GeoEnvironmental Information (CENIGA) at the Costa Rica’s Ministry of Environment and Energy (MINAE), to share how his team is helping advance conservation and economic development in Costa Rica and how they utilize ASDI and AWS to support these efforts.

On April 1, the US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) released the 1950 Census data to the general public. Census data is released 72 years after a census is conducted, and it has been 10 years since the last census data for the 1940 Census was publicly released. With the support of cloud technologies, this release marks a number of important firsts. AWS is honored to support the release of the 1950 Census and help make this data available to the public.

As educators, students, and parents become more comfortable with virtual learning, augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) have emerged as engaging tools for teachers to support their curriculum across K12, higher education, and lifelong learning institutions. With AR/VR experiences, students can take field trips across the globe, exercise their cognitive skills, and engage in play-based learning. Learn how four education technology companies (EdTechs) in the AWS EdStart accelerator use AWS to create AR/VR technology that enhances the student experience.