Today, I’m excited to announce our plans to open a new AWS Region in New Zealand! The AWS Asia Pacific (Auckland) Region will have three Availability Zones and allow AWS customers and partners the ability to run workloads and store data locally in New Zealand.

The AWS Asia Pacific (Auckland) Region will join eight existing AWS Regions and 25 Availability Zones across Asia in Australia, Greater China, India, Japan, Korea, and Singapore. AWS customers already use 81 Availability Zones across 25 geographic AWS Regions, and with today’s news, AWS has announced plans for 24 more Availability Zones and eight more AWS Regions in New Zealand, Australia, India, Indonesia, Israel, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Arab Emirates. You can learn more about our regions by visiting the AWS Global Infrastructure website.

I’m excited about our new Region in New Zealand because it builds on the long-term commitment we made to the country eight years ago when AWS opened our first office in Auckland. Today, AWS has tens of thousands of active customers and AWS Partners across the country using our services to innovate quickly, increase operational efficiencies, and take their ideas to the world. These include Air NZ, ANZ, BNZ, Contact Energy, Datacom, Deloitte, New Zealand Department of Justice, New Zealand Department of Conservation, Education Perfect, Halter, Kiwibank, Lancom, New Zealand Ministry of Health, New Zealand Ministry of Justice, Orion Health, Sharsies, Spark, The Clinician, TVNZ, UneeQ, University of Auckland, Vector, Vodafone, Xero, and many more.

Opening an AWS Region in Auckland brings our deep portfolio of services closer to our customers in New Zealand, further improving our already rapid responsiveness. In addition to the security, availability, performance, scalability, and flexibility benefits that set AWS apart, customers rely on our global footprint. AWS uses the concept of a Region, which is a physical location around the world where we cluster data centers. We call each group of data centers an Availability Zone (AZ), and each AWS Region consists of multiple, isolated, and physically separate AZs within a geographic area. Unlike other cloud providers who define a region as a single data center, the multiple-AZ design of every AWS Region offers advantages for customers since each AZ has independent power, cooling, and physical security and is connected through redundant, ultra-low latency networks. As of this year, all our Regions have three or more Availability Zones. Opening an AWS Region in Auckland delivers Kiwis the highest levels of security, compliance, and data protection, with the proven performance and reliability that only AWS provides.

AWS also works with a strong community of partners in New Zealand who provide knowledge, expertise, and services to support our customers' digital transformations. Last April, we opened our AWS Marketplace to New Zealand Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and Consulting Partners. This new sales channel provides our partners with instant access to more than 310,000 monthly active users around the world who can now find, buy, deploy, and manage their software services. One great example is our local New Zealand partner, Consegna, who found Australian software provider Local Measure’s customer platform so interesting, they bundled it with their own consulting services—and listed the new service offering on the AWS Marketplace, allowing them to access a global market.

Our customer and partner, Deloitte, offers another example of how AWS’s commitment to New Zealand helps it accelerate growth and innovation in the country. Deloitte New Zealand Consulting Deputy Managing Partner Dave Farrelly said:

“The global infrastructure AWS provides makes it possible for us to deliver agile, innovative, and impactful solutions to New Zealand organizations. Deloitte has been an AWS Premier Consulting Partner since 2017, which has helped us have significant impact in disrupting industries, driving innovation and providing leadership, risk management, and multi-disciplinary technical delivery capabilities for cloud transformations throughout the public and private sectors.

“Furthermore, recognising the tech skills shortage in New Zealand, the firm launched the Deloitte Digital Cadetship program which provides an accessible, collaborative and hands-on learning experience. This has boosted the AWS expertise we can offer clients as well as help grow the skilled talent pool in New Zealand. The first cohort was so successful we are recruiting again for the next group of cadets for the program. In addition to the cadetships, we’ve trained over 60 business leaders on AWS Cloud Practitioner in the past three months through the Deloitte Cloud Guild. We understand the importance of ensuring our people have up-to-date skills to deliver the advanced technology products and services New Zealand organisations need for success.”

The AWS Asia Pacific (Auckland) Region will provide many more such opportunities for individuals in New Zealand to develop skills and build on top of the world’s most comprehensive cloud offering. AWS is passionate about upskilling developers, students, and the next generation of IT leaders to drive economic growth and job creation in New Zealand. Globally, we have a goal to train 29 million people by 2025, and in New Zealand, Kiwis can already access more than 500 free courses, interactive labs, and virtual day-long training sessions through AWS Training and Certification.

Finally, we designed the new AWS Region with sustainability at its heart. At Amazon, we’re committed to running our business in an eco-friendly way, and we aim to reach net-zero-carbon across all our operations by 2040 as part of the Climate Pledge—10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement goals. We are currently on track to run all Amazon operations with 100% renewable energy by 2025.

New Zealand has a long history of pioneering, innovation, and invention, and the launch of the new AWS Region in Auckland will give Kiwis an opportunity to continue creating new and exciting ideas and services for the benefit of us all. I can’t wait to see what comes next.