Amazon Web Services (AWS), an Amazon.com company has announced plans to open an infrastructure region in Thailand. This new AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region will consist of three Availability Zones (AZs), joining the existing 87 Availability Zones across 27 geographic AWS Regions.
Globally, AWS has now announced plans to add 24 more Availability Zones and 8 more AWS Regions in Australia, Canada, India, Israel, New Zealand, Spain, Switzerland and Thailand. The upcoming AWS region in Thailand will allow developers, startups, large enterprises, as well as government agencies, educational institutions and non-profit organizations to run applications and serve end users from data centers located in Thailand.
It will be possible. This will allow customers who wish to keep their data within Thailand to do so. Additionally, as part of its commitment to the region, AWS will invest an estimated more than $5 billion (THB190 billion) in Thailand over 15 years.
Prasad Kalyanaraman, Vice President of Infrastructure Services at AWS, said: “We are committed to supporting Thailand’s digital transformation through local infrastructure investments and fast-paced innovation, helping Thai customers to realize the full potential of the cloud and businesses and institutions to serve their stakeholders. The AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region enables organizations to build with AWS technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, data analytics, and the Internet of Things. With ‘s new tools, AWS empowers governments to engage more closely with their citizens, businesses to innovate for their next stage of growth, and entrepreneurs to build businesses and compete on a global scale.”
Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Energy Minister His Excellency Supattanapong Phanmekao said: “AWS’s data center construction plan in Thailand is an important part of realizing Thailand 4.0 goals of providing advanced cloud computing services to more organizations and realizing a digitized, value-based economy. This is a milestone, and the Thai government is pleased to work with AWS, the world’s leading cloud service provider, to bring a world-class, highly secure and fault-tolerant cloud infrastructure to Thailand. The investment will make the country more competitive, generate significant long-term economic returns, and help build a highly skilled workforce.”
His Excellency Chaiwut Tanakamanusorn, Minister of Digital Economy and Society (MDES) of Thailand said: “The AWS regions in Thailand will help businesses and government agencies deliver superior digital services that will benefit the public for decades to come. MDES and AWS will help modernize legacy infrastructure and improve operations. We have worked together to support the government’s digital transformation, and AWS’s investment will bring Thailand one step closer to a digital future.”
Narit Tate Sathyrasak, Secretary General of the Thailand Board of Investment, said: “Cloud services are one of the most important drivers of the digital economy. It will advance Thailand’s position as an investment destination.The AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region will enhance Thailand’s international competitiveness while spurring innovation and economic productivity in all industries in Thailand. will be.”
AWS Regions are made up of Availability Zones. Availability Zones are the placement of infrastructure in distinct geographies that are sufficiently far apart to significantly reduce the risk of a single event impacting customer business continuity. Conversely, they are placed close enough to achieve low latency for highly available applications that use multiple Availability Zones. Each Availability Zone has independent power, cooling, physical security, and is connected by a redundant, ultra-low-latency network. AWS customers who value high availability can also design for even greater resilience by running their applications across multiple geographies in multiple Availability Zones.
The new AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region will enable local customers with data residency desires and requirements to safely store their data in Thailand while achieving even lower latency across the country. From start-ups to large enterprises, government agencies, and non-profits, customers will be able to leverage the world’s leading advanced cloud technologies to drive innovation. AWS offers the broadest and deepest service portfolio, including analytics, compute, databases, Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, mobile services, storage, and other cloud technologies.
Thai organizations are among the millions of active AWS customers in over 190 countries around the world. Thai organizations choosing AWS to run their workloads to accelerate innovation, increase agility and reduce costs include 2C2P, CP All Plc., Digital Economy Promotion Agency, Energy Response (ENRES), Companies include Papyrus Studio, PTT Global, PTT Oil and Retail Business, Siam Cement Group, Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University, and Stock Exchange of Thailand.
Partners in Thailand are part of the AWS Partner Network (APN). This includes over 100,000 independent software vendors (ISVs) and system integrators (SIs) worldwide. AWS partners build innovative solutions and services on AWS, and APN provides customers with business, technical, marketing, and commercial support. APN’s SIs, consulting partners, and ISVs help enterprise and public sector customers migrate to AWS, deploy mission-critical applications, and provide full monitoring, automation, and management services for their environments. increase. AWS Thailand partners include DailiTech, G-Able, National Telecom, NTT Thailand and True IDC. AWS ISVs in Thailand, including 2C2P and Amity, are already using AWS to deliver their software to customers around the world, and the AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region will serve customers in Thailand from its launch.
AWS investment in Thailand
The upcoming AWS Asia Pacific (Bangkok) Region is the latest in AWS’ ongoing investments in Thailand to provide customers with advanced and secure cloud technology. Since 2020, AWS has launched 10 Amazon CloudFront edge locations in Bangkok. Amazon CloudFront is a highly secure programmable content delivery network (CDN) that delivers low latency, high speed data, video, applications and APIs to users around the world. In 2020, AWS launched AWS Outposts in Thailand. AWS Outposts are a family of fully managed solutions that deliver AWS infrastructure and services to virtually any on-premises or edge location for a truly consistent hybrid experience.
AWS plans to deepen its investment in Thailand with the upcoming AWS Local Zone in Bangkok. An AWS Local Zone is a type of AWS infrastructure deployment that places compute, storage, databases, and other select services close to large populations, industries, and IT centers so that customers can to deliver applications that require single-digit millisecond latencies.
To support the growth of cloud adoption in Thailand, AWS continues to invest in upskilling local developers, students and Thailand’s next generation of IT leaders through programs such as AWS re/Start, AWS Academy and AWS Educate doing. These AWS education programs prepare learners of all backgrounds and experiences for careers in the cloud. From college courses to full-time training programs to self-paced content, AWS Education Programs provide skills training to help individuals start or grow their careers in the cloud. Eight Thai higher education institutions in Bangkok, Chiang Rai and Pathum Thani have integrated AWS Academy courses into their curricula. AWS also works directly with organizations like Siam Cement Group to help build in-demand cloud skills and educate employees. AWS will collaborate with Thailand’s Ministry of Digital Economy and Society on a Skilling Plan and provide support to train more than 1,200 employees in cloud skills, on-demand digital courses, and accelerated training events. This will equip government officials with the skills they need to innovate new services that drive large-scale adoption of cloud technologies, better data-driven business decisions, and better outcomes for citizens. increase.
To continue fostering entrepreneurship in Thailand, AWS provides support to early stage startups through the AWS Activate program. The program provides guidance, one-on-one interaction with AWS experts, technical support, business mentorship, and access to up to $100,000 in AWS service credits, all at no charge. AWS also collaborates with the venture capital community, start-up accelerators and incubators to help start-ups grow in the cloud. In Thailand, accelerator organizations such as AIS The Startup and Stormbreaker are doing this, helping their portfolio companies grow rapidly.
In 2021, AWS will expand its Startup Ramp program to ASEAN. The program aims to help early-stage start-up entrepreneurs build, launch and grow solutions in health, digital government, smart cities, agriculture and space technology. AWS Startup Ramp is for entrepreneurs who want to make an impact in the public sector by providing technical design and architecture reviews, mentorship, credit and go-to-market planning support to navigate complex regulatory and security requirements. working to remove barriers to Early-stage startups committed to finding product-market fit and meeting their first customers are eligible to apply for the Startup Ramp Innovators. Startups with paying customers looking to grow and scale can take advantage of program benefits by applying for Startup Ramp Innovators.
Since 2017, AWS EdStart, the AWS Education Technology Startup Accelerator, has helped entrepreneurs build the next generation of online learning, analytics and campus management solutions. AWS EdStart members in Thailand include Gantik, OpenDurian and Vonder. These members use AWS EdStart to help students make informed decisions in the curriculum, to provide experiential learning opportunities to primary and secondary schools across the country, and to We build innovative solutions that enable virtual mentoring between entrepreneurs.
Commitment to sustainability
As part of The Climate Pledge , Amazon is committed to becoming a more sustainable company and achieving net zero carbon across its operations by 2040, ten years ahead of the Paris Agreement. Amazon co-launched The Climate Pledge in 2019 and became its first signatory. As part of the Climate Pledge initiative, Amazon is aiming to operate on 100% renewable energy by 2025, five years earlier than its original 2030 target. Amazon is the world’s largest purchaser of renewable energy, with 85% renewable energy across its operations as of the end of 2021. For more information on Amazon’s approach, please see our published methodology . Organizations that migrate computing workloads to the AWS Cloud can reap the net benefits of Amazon’s sustainability efforts in reducing their carbon footprint.
