Re:Invent 2019 Part 1

Hi Everyone, this is Chris Brandt with another AWS Re:Invent update. Before I get started I just wanted to say, if you enjoy these videos, please like and subscribe, click the bell to get notifications when I post new content. I usually do that at the end, so I thought I would try it up front for a change.

AWS Re:Invent was held once again in Las Vegas Nevada. This show has grown so large, there are few cities that can house it. Re:Invent this year had capacity for 65,000 attendees, and by all accounts they were pretty close to maximum capacity. The show spanned 6 properties in Las Vegas, and rumors have it that they are going to be adding in Mandalay Bay next year in an attempt to hit 80,000 in attendance which is absolutely mind-blowing. 

While attendance was down for shows across the board this year, Re:Invent grew. I believe that many companies now believe this is the only show they need to attend any more.

I had an interesting conversation while I was at Re:Invent about the level of cloud maturity. There was a famous book by Geoffrey Moore called crossing the chasm, which is a very popular look at technology marketing. It leverages the rogers innovation curve to identify the various stages of market maturity for a product. You can check out my video on the subject here.

This person was adamant that cloud was sitting in the laggard category, which is when a technology is so pervasive, even the deepest naysayers are dragged into using it. My contention is that Cloud has finally crossed the chasm from early adopters or the visionary class to early majority or the pragmatists. Early adopters tend to be change agents within an organization, who are not as price sensitive, while the pragmatists wait to see their peers in the industry being successful with a technology before adopting it, and they tend to be much more price conscious. 

This is what I see happening in the cloud space. People are now having more complex discussions about the technology. They are selective about what has been successful in the cloud, and they are having deeper discussions around what it means to shift so much spend from CapEx to a variable OpEx. This says tells me that the pragmatists are entering the market. 

Much of this is also being driven by the massive rise of SaaS. Companies are rapidly adopting all kinds of SaaS products, which is helping them overcome the enablement gap. These companies are much better suited to a mature cloud deployment model. They are also intent on a multi-cloud approach, which will help drive a more competitive cloud market.

All this is to say, I think for all the talk of cloud over the years, we are finally seeing I evolve past its infancy, poised to really expand.

This is why Re:Invent continues to grow at a rapid pace. It is not only an attractive show to end users, vendors are being selective as well. If you want to talk with a lot of vendors, this is the show to be at. Even vendors that have little going on with AWS are there, because their customers are there. The VCs were even there, so it shows you how important this show really is.

So lets take a little walk through the vendors.

Some open source vendors like Elastic have been very vocal, complaining about AWS’s use of their code in some of AWS’s products, but that didn’t stop them from showing up.

There was one new company that isn’t entirely out of stealth there and that is Transposit. I am excited to see where this company is going. The company’s CEO is Divanny Lamas a super smart VC from Sutter Hill Ventures. This is a new project coming out of Sutter Hill, and it has a lot of promise to fill some big gaps in the market. They weren’t ready to do an interview just yet, but I will keep working on them.

One interesting  side note about Re:Invent. AWS restricts the vendors from talking about multi-cloud or hybrid cloud. They even go to the extent of walking the floor before the show opens with black tape to hide any references on the vendor’s booths. This year they were supposed to be less restrictive on this since AWS is now talking about hybrid cloud, but the report from the floor was that they were just as restrictive as previous years.

Trying to keep these short as possible. In Part II I will look at some of the product announcements from AWS. They have something like 175 products (although I count about 191). There was a ton stuff announced and discussed, so I will do my best to hit as many highlights as I can.

So, thanks for watching, I really appreciate it. If you like what you saw, please like, subscribe and if you want to be notified when I post new content, click that bell, and I will see you in the next video.

You can get Crossing the Chasm here: https://amzn.to/2JaQGpv