AWS, Ingram Micro To Expand Public Sector Offerings For Partners

“They’re connecting all of those partners to AWS, enabling them, helping them get the most out of the AWS partnership – and it results in better customer outcomes,” Amazon Web Services channel chief Ruba Borno tells CRN in an interview.

Amazon Web Services and Ingram Micro have expanded their multi-year strategic collaboration agreement to bring initiatives and joint investments for worldwide public sector organizations to thousands of channel partners.

As part of the expansion to the companies’ 2021 agreement, Ingram Micro will offer more services from the Seattle-based cloud giant aimed at nonprofits; federal, state and local government agencies and health care, education and research institutions. The services will be available across the United States, Canada, Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe and Asia Pacific, according to a statement Wednesday.

The companies announced the expansion during Ingram Micro’s Cloud Summit 2022 event held in person in Miami Beach. Unlike major vendor events held during the COVID-19 pandemic, which were online only or featured an online component, Ingram Micro held its summit only in person without any sessions streaming online.

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AWS has invested in expanding its relationship with a variety of distributors, including Ingram Micro, Pax8 and TD Synnex.

Irvine, Calif.-based Ingram Micro will provide developmental engagement and practice-build frameworks to help customers become go-to-market ready for AWS public sector customers, according to the statement.

CRN has reached out to Ingram Micro for comment.

Andy Belval, chief revenue officer at Keystone Technologies – a Eureka, Mo.-based AWS partner – told CRN in an interview that the expanded partnership is a win for his company because Ingram Micro can help Keystone meet with the right AWS executives and take full advantage of AWS’ health care-related services.

Keystone has been an AWS partner for about three years and an Ingram Micro partner for at least a decade, Belval said.

“Ingram Micro is helping us navigate the landscape that is AWS,” he said. “They are absolutely instrumental.”

Ruba Borno, AWS’ vice president of worldwide channels and alliances, told CRN in an interview that distributors are important to how AWS goes to market and interacts with partners.

“They have a broader reach and they really are able to recruit and enable partners and develop their capabilities and work with them,” Borno said.

Since 2018, partners working with Ingram Micro and AWS have experienced growth on average of 75 percent year over year and up to 176 percent year over year, she said.

“It’s clearly working really well,” she said. “And then we just think when partnerships are thriving like that, it’s better for everyone because it‘s enabling the customers to transform. There’s definitely demand there. And what Ingram is doing is – they‘re connecting all of those partners to AWS, enabling them, helping them get the most out of the AWS partnership – and it results in better customer outcomes. So we’re excited about the growth for partners because it means growth for customers.”

Jeremiah Jenson, AWS’ global leader of distribution, said that distributors can help AWS communicate with existing partners about new offerings and even add new partners.

“Partners – and especially distribution – they expand our reach and they expand our relationships, especially within the context and the backdrop of global business,” Jenson said. “The speed at which distribution and Ingram, TD Synnex and other partners can get to these partners and help them accelerate their cloud journey is something we‘re excited about.”

He continued: “What customers tell us is – they want partners that understand their business. It‘s no longer good enough to be someone that just is a jack-of-all-trades or is one-to-many. They want someone that deeply understands their business, the outcomes that they want and the specialized AWS services that immediately get them there.”

The expanded partnership means Ingram Micro can develop new offerings on AWS and scale its resources in sales enablement, practice development, technical enablement, professional services, business support, financial support and other areas.

Ingram Micro is an AWS advanced consulting partner and distributor with “well-architected” partner status and competencies in development operations (DevOps) and cloud management tools, according to the statement.

Ingram Micro Cloud has an AWS “cloud center of excellence” team with more than 250 AWS certifications as well as professional, managed services, operations and billing services.