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AWS Launches first Australian AWS Local Zones location in Perth

AWS Local Zones help AWS customers deliver distributed edge and hybrid cloud applications that require single-digit millisecond latency to end users in Perth

Curtin University, HBF, Mechanical Rock, Nearmap, and Woodside Energy are among customers and AWS Partners welcoming the launch
 

PERTH, Australia—Jan. 13, 2023—Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com, Inc. company (NASDAQ: AMZN), today announced the launch of the first AWS Local Zones location in Australia, in Perth. AWS Local Zones are a type of infrastructure deployment that places AWS compute, storage, database, and other services near large population, industry, and information technology (IT) centers⁠—enabling customers to deploy applications that require single-digit millisecond latency to end users or on-premises data centers. Customers can run workloads with low latency requirements on AWS Local Zones while seamlessly connecting to the rest of their workloads running in AWS Regions. AWS now has 29 AWS Local Zones around the world, with announced plans to launch 23 more AWS Local Zones globally, including a location in Brisbane. To get started with AWS Local Zones, visit aws.amazon.com/about-aws/global-infrastructure/localzones/locations.

For applications that require single-digit millisecond latency, the location of cloud infrastructure matters. Most customer workloads run in an AWS Region, a geographic location where AWS clusters data centers to serve customers. However, when an AWS Region is not close enough to meet low latency or data residency preferences, customers need AWS infrastructure closer to their data source or end users. Organizations have traditionally maintained these location-sensitive workloads on premises or in managed data centers that require customers to procure, operate, and maintain their own IT infrastructure, and use different sets of APIs and tools for their on-premises and AWS environments.

AWS manages and supports AWS Local Zones, meaning customers do not incur the expense and effort of procuring, operating, and maintaining infrastructure in various cities to support low latency applications. AWS Local Zones can also help organizations migrate additional workloads to AWS, supporting a hybrid cloud migration strategy and simplifying IT operations.

“AWS’s investment to launch its first Australian AWS Local Zones location in Perth is a big win for Western Australian organizations and the economy,” said the Hon. Stephen Dawson, Western Australian minister for Innovation and the Digital Economy. “An AWS Local Zones location in Perth opens up more opportunities for Western Australian businesses to innovate and develop new services enabling better experiences for their customers and our citizens. Having world-class cloud infrastructure here in Perth will drive our state’s innovation agenda and strengthen the diversification of our economy. We’re pleased that AWS’s continued investment in our state supports the next generation of innovators.”

The launch of AWS Local Zones location in Perth gives customers the ability to easily deploy applications close to end users in the metro area. Having AWS Local Zones close to large population centers in metro areas enables customers to achieve the low latency required for use cases like video analytics, online gaming, virtual workstations, live streaming, remote healthcare, and augmented and virtual reality. They can also help customers operating in regulated sectors like healthcare, financial services, mining and resources, and public sector that might have preferences or requirements to keep data within a geographic boundary.

“We are pleased to deepen our investments in Western Australia by bringing the first Australian AWS Local Zones location to Perth,” said Sarah Bassett, head of Western Australia, South Australia and Queensland Enterprise at AWS Australia. “Speed matters in business, and we’ve designed AWS Local Zones to deliver low latency capabilities for organizations to improve the performance of their digital applications, process large amounts of data faster, and drive productivity gains. The launch of AWS Local Zones location in Perth is a continuation of our investment to support organizations running all types of workloads by bringing secure, extensive, and reliable cloud infrastructure closer to our customers.”

The launch of AWS Local Zones location in Perth is the newest addition to AWS infrastructure in Australia, including the AWS Asia Pacific (Sydney) Region, seven Amazon CloudFront edge locations, six AWS Direct Connect locations, and the announced AWS Asia Pacific (Melbourne) Region.

AWS customers and AWS Partners welcome the launch of AWS Local Zones in Perth

Curtin University is an Australian public research university, based in Perth, that supports more than 50,000 students. “Curtin University is on a journey to build a cloud-based digital platform, powered by AWS, which will enable us to move out of our on-campus data centers to ensure we can take full advantage of digital services,” said Jason Cowie, chief information officer at Curtin University. "Flexibility is key in delivering the services and experiences that our staff and students require. An AWS Local Zones location in Perth gives us more choice in where we host our workloads – whether to bring cloud closer to our students using AWS Local Zones or supporting large-scale IT migrations across our global campuses using the AWS Region in Sydney. Today’s announcement brings us one step closer to operating 100% on AWS, while enhancing our security and operational resiliency.”

HBF is Australia's second-largest not-for-profit health insurer, providing hospital and ancillary insurance to approximately 1.1 million members nationwide. “We have selected AWS as our cloud provider in our cloud-first strategy,” said Sanjeev Gupta, chief information and transformation officer at HBF. “AWS enables us to innovate at pace, process data faster, and enhance our service capabilities to benefit our large customer base in Western Australia and across Australia. The launch of the Perth AWS Local Zones location will help HBF to deliver future applications that require ultra-low latency”

Mechanical Rock is a Perth-based IT consultancy and AWS Advanced Consulting Partner that specializes in product development, modern data platforms, and enterprise DevOps-focused transformation. “Today’s launch of AWS Local Zones location in Perth is a game-changer for us and the services we’ll be able to offer local organizations,” said Hamish Tedeschi, founder and CEO at Mechanical Rock. “AWS Local Zones will enable us to help more customers run latency-sensitive applications closer to their offices and sites, while addressing data residency preferences for our healthcare, financial services, and government customers.”

Nearmap is a Perth-founded location intelligence company providing organizations with easy access to high-resolution aerial imagery, city-scale 3D content, artificial intelligence data sets, and geospatial tools. “We have compute-heavy artificial intelligence and machine learning workloads that would be challenging to run without the scalability of AWS,” said Dr. Rob Newman, CEO and managing director at Nearmap. “AWS helps us provide our customers with real-time access to petabytes of Nearmap location data instantly via the web and APIs. The AWS Local Zones location in Perth gives us more options to reduce latency to drive better user experiences for our customers in Western Australia accessing high-resolution aerial imagery and location data.”

Woodside Energy is a global energy company founded in Australia. “Our digital twin solution, Fuse, allows us to create a virtual replica of our operations, pulling data from sensors, cameras, and robots to help us make more informed business decisions,” said Ben Wilkinson, chief digital officer at Woodside Energy. “An AWS Local Zones location in Perth will give us the low latency capabilities we need for future Fuse use cases and help us continue re-imagining how our business can be operated more efficiently through the use of automation and digital twins.”

About Amazon Web Services

For over 15 years, Amazon Web Services has been the world’s most comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud offering. AWS has been continually expanding its services to support virtually any cloud workload, and it now has more than 200 fully featured services for compute, storage, databases, networking, analytics, machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), mobile, security, hybrid, virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR), media, and application development, deployment, and management from 96 Availability Zones within 30 geographic regions, with announced plans for 15 more Availability Zones and five more AWS Regions in Australia, Canada, Israel, New Zealand, and Thailand. Millions of customers—including the fastest-growing startups, largest enterprises, and leading government agencies—trust AWS to power their infrastructure, become more agile, and lower costs. To learn more about AWS, visit aws.amazon.com.

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