AWS Competency Program & Financial Services Partners
The AWS Partner Network (APN) is thrilled to announce the launch of the new AWS Financial Services Competency. The AWS Competency Program is designed to highlight APN Partners who have demonstrated industry expertise, readily implemented solutions that align with AWS architectural best practices, and have staff with AWS-certifications.

Today, the AWS Partner Network (APN) team announced the launch of the AWS Service Delivery Program, a new program to help AWS customers quickly locate APN Partners who have proven expertise delivering specific AWS services such as Amazon Aurora, or AWS Lambda. Attaining an AWS Service Delivery Distinction allows APN Partners to differentiate themselves by showcasing to AWS customers areas of specialization.

The AWS Partner Network (APN) is making it easier to explore the APN Partner ecosystem by launching a new site called the AWS Partner Solutions Finder. Visit the AWS Partner Solutions Finder to discover APN Partners by Use Case, Industry, Product, or Location. Interested in learning more about a specific APN Partner? You can now search APN Partners of any tier within the APN. The Partner Solutions Finder gives you more visibility into APN Partners who are members of APN Programs including the AWS Competency, Service Delivery, and Managed Service Provider Programs. The new Partner Profile pages offer a new user experience that enables you to explore APN Partners either at a glance, or in detail. On the Partner Profile page, you can view the APN Partner’s skillset (validated by AWS), partner solutions and/or AWS-created case studies, and office locations. How can you engage with an APN Partner you identify through the Partner Solutions Finder? Simply click “connect” on the Partner Profile page, and the APN Partner will receive your inquiry.

Interested in accelerating your AWS Business? Find APN Partner Solutions today.

AWS Competency Program & IoT Partners
The AWS Partner Network (APN) is thrilled to announce the launch of the new AWS IoT Competency. The AWS Competency Program is designed to highlight APN Partners who have demonstrated technical proficiency and proven customer success in specialized solution areas and categories.

Effective December 1, 2016, we’re updating pricing for AWS Storage Gateway, making it more cost-effective to adopt cloud storage for your on-premises applications. There will be 3 changes to pricing: storage prices for volume and virtual tapes will be reduced; the monthly gateway fee will be replaced with pricing based on the amount of data you write to AWS; and virtual tape retrieval will be simplified, moving from rate-based fees to per GB pricing. 

AWS Storage Gateway now provides a virtual on-premises file server, which enables you to store and retrieve Amazon S3 objects through standard file storage protocols. With file gateway, existing applications or devices can use secure and durable cloud storage without needing to be modified. File gateway simplifies moving data into S3 for in-cloud workloads, provides cost-effective storage for backup and archive, or expands your on-premises storage into the cloud. 

Amazon WorkSpaces now offers bundles that come with a Windows 10 desktop experience, powered by Windows Server 2016. Amazon WorkSpaces Windows 10 bundles provides you an easy way to move users to a modern operating system, while also simplifying licensing. Amazon WorkSpaces continues to offer bundles that come with a Windows 7 desktop experience, provided by Windows Server 2008 R2. You can also run Windows 7 and Windows 10 Enterprise operating systems with Amazon WorkSpaces if your organization meets the licensing requirements set by Microsoft.

We’re excited to announce new features to the growing portfolio of Amazon S3 Storage Management capabilities to help you better analyze and manage your storage. Today’s release includes:

AWS Organizations makes it easier for IT teams to manage multiple AWS accounts. You can use Organizations to create groups of AWS accounts, and then apply policies to these groups to help centrally manage security and automation settings.

AWS has expanded its HIPAA compliance program to include Amazon Aurora and Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL. You can now use Amazon Aurora or RDS for PostgreSQL databases to build your HIPAA-compliant applications and store healthcare related information, including protected health information (PHI) under an executed Business Associate Agreement (BAA) with AWS.