Amazon Web Services (AWS), an Amazon.com, Inc. company, announced plans to launch an AWS infrastructure Region in Malaysia. The new AWS Region will give developers, startups, entrepreneurs, and enterprises, and govt, education, and nonprofit firms, greater choice for running their applications and serving end users from data centers located in Malaysia.
What does AWS Region mean for Malaysia?
As part of its commitment to the region, AWS is planning to invest $6bn (about MYR 25.5bn) in Malaysia by 2037. For more about AWS Global Infrastructure, please visit the website.
“The new AWS Region reflects our deep and long-term commitment to customers and organizations in Malaysia, as well as our commitment to serving sizeable and fast-growing demand for cloud services across Southeast Asia. We are proud to support Malaysia’s digital transformation with the highest levels of security and reliability available on AWS cloud infrastructure,” said Prasad Kalyanaraman, Vice President of Infrastructure Services at AWS.
“We look forward to helping institutions, startups, and companies deliver cloud-powered applications to fuel economic development across the country and to spur job creation, skills training, and educational opportunities in the communities surrounding our data centers.”
“AWS has committed to the largest international technology investment to date in Malaysia, which will advance our Malaysia Madani vision of a highly skilled, innovative, prosperous, and sustainable economy,” commented Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, Prime Minister of Malaysia.
“Bringing access to world-class AWS infrastructure, advanced tech, and cloud skills programs to Malaysia will unlock opportunities for businesses to expand globally, cultivate a skilled workforce, spur new job creation, and deliver long-term economic growth. The news is a vote of support for Malaysia’s leadership in the global digital economy, and we look forward to deepening our collaboration with AWS to advance our nation’s cloud-first ambitions.”
What is the market offering of the AWS Region?
The new AWS Region will consist of three Availability Zones at launch, adding to the 99 Availability Zones across 31 geographic regions. AWS has plans to launch 15 more Availability Zones and five more AWS Regions in Canada, Israel, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Thailand.
AWS Regions consist of Availability Zones that place infrastructure in separate and distinct geographic locations, with enough distance to significantly reduce the risk of a single event impacting customers’ business continuity, yet near enough to provide low latency for high availability apps that use multiple Availability Zones. Each zone has independent power, cooling, and security and is connected through redundant, ultra-low latency networks.
AWS customers focused on high availability can design their applications to run in multiple Availability Zones and across multiple Regions to achieve even greater fault tolerance.
The new AWS Region will enable customers with data residency preferences to store data securely in Malaysia, enable customers to achieve even lower latency, and serve demand for cloud services across Southeast Asia. Clients from startups to govt organizations and nonprofits will be able to use advanced tech from the leading cloud to drive innovation.
AWS offers the deepest portfolio of services, including analytics, compute, database, Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, mobile services, storage, and other cloud technologies.
What are the thoughts of AWS customers on the region?
Organizations in Malaysia are among the millions of active customers using Amazon Web Serrvices (AWS) in more than 190 countries around the world. Enterprises in Malaysia choose AWS to innovate, drive cost efficiencies, and accelerate time to market-segment. Customers using AWS include Astro Malaysia Berhad, Axiata Group, Bank Islam Malaysia, CelcomDigi, Johor Corporation, PayNet, and Petroliam Nasional Berhad (PETRONAS).
Malaysian public sector customers use Amazon Web Services to help drive cost savings and better serve local citizens. These customers include Asia Pacific University of Technology & Innovation, BeEducation, Cybersecurity Malaysia, Department of Statistics Malaysia, Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia, Pos Malaysia, and Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB).
Malaysian startups and small businesses, including Baba Products, Carsome, Omesti Berhad, and StoreHub, are building their businesses on AWS to rapidly scale nationally and worldwide.
PayNet
PayNet, the national payments network and shared central infrastructure for Malaysia’s financial market-segment, uses AWS to run critical banking workloads, including the company’s MyDebit cashless payments system. “As the nation’s operator of real-time retail payments infrastructure, we leverage AWS to meet the reliability, security, scalability, and compliance required by our customers,” said Farhan Ahmad, Group CEO at PayNet.
“The launch of an AWS Region in Malaysia provides us with lower-latency access to cloud services to help ensure our customers have a seamless payments experience. We’re excited to see how this development can pave the way for other companies in the region to innovate with speed and uncover new opportunities,” Farhan Ahmad further commented.
PETRONAS
PETRONAS, a global energy and solutions provider with presence in over 50 countries, has been an AWS client since 2014. “Our work with AWS has supported our digital solutions and enabled us to use the cloud as an accelerator. We have also leveraged Amazon’s working backwards methodology to ideate and scale innovation best practices to pursue new growth opportunities,” said Datuk Tengku Muhammad Taufik, President and Group CEO at PETRONAS.
“With the launch in Malaysia, we look forward to further strengthening our collaboration with AWS to develop scalable solutions, deliver greater value to our stakeholders, and play a part in achieving Malaysia’s vision to become a regional leader in the digital economy.”
Pos Malaysia
Pos Malaysia, Malaysia’s national postal and parcel service provider, has the largest delivery and retail network in the country, delivering to more than 10 million addresses and operating more than 3,500 retail touchpoints. As part of the company’s digital transformation, Pos Malaysia plans to migrate the vast majority of its IT infrastructure to AWS by 2023.
“As we continue on our digital transformation journey to deliver a better customer experience, our collaboration with Amazon Web Services has been instrumental in streamlining our processes, reducing IT costs by 50%, and driving greater organizational agility,” commented Sumesh Rahavendra, Chief Strategy and Digital Officer, Pos Malaysia.
“We are excited about the launch of an AWS Region in Malaysia and look forward to incorporating deep analytics and machine learning initiatives into our operations to help further develop our products and services, enabling us to deliver smiles to the last mile.”
TNB
TNB is the largest electricity utility provider in Malaysia and services more than 9.5 million commercial, industrial, and residential customers nationally. TNB has collaborated with AWS since 2020 to accelerate its digital transformation, improve customer experience, and develop smart energy solutions. “TNB is on a mission to digitally transform and become more than just a utility provider,” said Azlan bin Ahmad, Chief Information Officer at TNB.
“Leveraging world-class AWS services such as compute, machine learning, and artificial intelligence will help us accelerate the launch of innovative digital services, enabling customers to more easily track and manage their energy usage. We welcome the launch of an AWS Region in Malaysia, which will help boost the efficiency and agility of industries, helping companies deliver a wider range of services to improve the lives of local citizens.”
What does the region mean for Malaysian AWS Partners?
The AWS Partner Network (APN) includes tens of thousands of independent software vendors (ISVs) and systems integrators (SIs) around the world. Amazon Web Services Partners build innovative solutions and services on AWS, and the AWS Partner Network helps by providing business, technical, marketing, and go-to-market support to customers.
Amazon Web Services ISVs, SIs, and consulting partners help enterprise and public sector customers migrate to AWS, deploy mission-critical applications, and provide a full range of monitoring, automation, and management services for customers’ cloud environments.
Examples of Malaysia-based Amazon Web Services Partners include Axrail, eCloudvalley, Exabytes, G-AsiaPacific, GHL, Maxis, Radmik Solutions Sdn Bhd, Silverlake Axis, Tapway, Uberfusion, and Wavelet. For the full list of Amazon Web Services Partners, visit the website.
Maxis
Maxis is Malaysia’s leading converged solutions provider and an AWS Advanced Tier Services Partner. In 2019, Maxis signed an agreement with AWS to deliver industry-leading cloud tech enabled by 4G to help organizations improve productivity, performance, and innovation.
“Maxis aspires to be the one-stop shop for all IT and connectivity services in Malaysia, and we see AWS as a key factor in helping us achieve this goal. We look forward to providing businesses in Malaysia with greater access to world-class cloud solutions to accelerate cloud adoption and empower businesses to be better equipped for Industry 4.0, in line with the government’s cloud-first ambition,” said Goh Seow Eng, Chief Executive Officer at Maxis.
Silverlake Axis
Silverlake Axis is an enterprise tech, software, and services company and an AWS Software Partner. “Silverlake Axis’s collaboration with AWS has helped us create a future vision of our digital solution by 25 omnichannel applications like transactions, loans, payments, and digital engagement,” commented Andrew Tan, Group Managing Director at Silverlake Axis.
“We can now offer clients various combinations of digital solutions with pay-as-you-go pricing, which provides a customized and seamless customer experience across all channels.”
“An AWS Region in Malaysia will be transformative for the technology services industry, providing secure, high-performing, resilient, and regulated infrastructure for digital banking workloads or insurtech businesses. This will help us accelerate the launch of new features and let our customers pivot quickly to leverage the benefits of the cloud,” Andrew Tan added.
What does this mean for AWS sustainability push?
As part of The Climate Pledge, Amazon is committed to reaching net-zero carbon across its business by 2040 and is on a path to powering operations with 100% renewable energy by 2025, five years ahead of the original 2030 target. In 2022, Amazon set a new corporate record for the most renewable energy announced by a single company in one year and remains the largest corporate buyer of renewable energy—a position it’s held since 2020.
Amazon now has 401 renewable energy projects globally, including 164 wind farms and solar farms, and 237 rooftop solar projects on Amazon facilities. Once operational, Amazon’s global renewable energy projects are expected to generate 56,881 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of clean energy each year. In addition, Amazon Web Services will be water positive by 2030, returning more water to communities than it uses in its direct operations.
