Cloud AWS re:Invent Coverage | AWS’s Julia Chen on Helping Customers Drive Profitable Growth with AWS Co-Selling Partnerships

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Julia Chen

VP, AWS Partner Core

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AWS enriches partner network with new AI services

A deep network of partners is at the heart of Amazon Web Services Inc., supported by its Partner Core division.The cloud computing company has focused on developing ever-faster artificial intelligence technologies with, and for the benefit of, its partners.“We’re going to be able to modernize code really, really quickly, so anything from Java 8 to Java 17 — these kinds of things that used to take thousands of man-hours,” said Julia Chen (pictured), vice president of Partner Core at AWS. “The democratization of the AI, everything from the chips getting to be 60% faster, all the way to some of these developer tools, I think are for me, the most exciting things

play_circle_outline Introduction to AWS re:Invent and interview with Julia Chen, VP of AWS Partner Core

play_circle_outline Updates on Gen AI, business outcome accelerator program, managed service program, Buy with AWS on Marketplace

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AWS’s Julia Chen on Helping Customers Drive Profitable Growth with AWS Co-Selling Partnerships

Julia Chen

VP, AWS Partner Core AWS

Julia Chen, VP of AWS Partner Core, discusses updates like Gen AI, Q for Developer, and new developer tools at AWS re:Invent. Initiatives such as the business outcome accelerator program benefit partners and customers. AWS is focused on collaboration and driving innovation, with the goal of having partners in 100% of customer accounts. They are committed to customer obsession and improving the partnership experience.

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What is Julia Chen's role at AWS and what does she focus on in her role? add

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AWS’s Julia Chen on Helping Customers Drive Profitable Growth with AWS Co-Selling Partnerships

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Shelly Kramer

>> Hello. And welcome to theCUBE. I'm your host, Shelly Kramer, Managing Director and Principal Analyst at theCUBE Research. And today I am at AWS re:Invent, where I am surrounded by thousands of tech nerds, of which I am a proud tech nerd myself. And I'm so thrilled. Today I have the opportunity to interview Julia Chen, who's the VP of AWS Partner Core, Specialists and Partners at AWS. So Julia, welcome. So glad to see you.

Julia Chen

>> Yes. Thank you so much for having me. I'm happy to be here.

Shelly Kramer

>> Absolutely. Well, partners are one of my very favorite things. Of course, the partner ecosystem is what makes it all happen, right?

Julia Chen

>> Yes.

Shelly Kramer

>> And so we love partners. Julia, I'd love for you to tell me a little bit about your role at AWS and what you spend your time thinking about.

Julia Chen

>> Absolutely. So my role, so I'm in charge of something called Core. And so what Core is, it's kind of the foundation of all of our business with partners. It's the foundation of our value exchange. So all the partner programs, all the partner contracts, some of the enablement, the digital interface, and the tools and the initiatives that we have with our partners run through my team. So I wake up every morning and try to figure out how to optimize the value exchange with our partners and make sure that they're super successful with AWS.

Shelly Kramer

>> Awesome. Well, I know that we had a ton of updates the last couple of days here at re.Invent. Walk me through some of the things that you're most excited about.

Julia Chen

>> Oh my goodness. So I'd be remiss if we didn't hit Gen AI. So we've had several different announcements on Gen AI. The one that I'm most excited about, having been a ... You said you're a tech nerd. I'm also a tech nerd. I started out as a software engineer. So couple of things there, but one of them is around Q for Developer and how we're going to be able to modernize code really, really quickly. So anything from Java 8 to Java 17, but also things like COBOL, all the way to Java, these kinds of things that used to take thousands of man-hours, and in some cases the people don't even exist that built the first one, right? That's going to be amazing. So everything that we talked about, the democratization of the AI, everything from the chips getting to be 60% faster all the way to some of these developer tools, I think, are for me the most exciting things. In the world of partners, we also had some really exciting announcements. So one announcement is around our business outcome accelerator program that we're launching for our partners that help them come together and create these business outcomes for the customers. Another big announcement is around our managed service program, which we've made GA for our partners. And so this really allows us to pour fuel on the managed service motion for our partners, which really benefits our customers because they deliver business outcomes with an SLA. And then maybe the last one that I'll highlight that I love is Buy with AWS on Marketplace, which allows our partners to actually access Marketplace through their own storefronts. And that way, their customers can discover more of their services through their own storefront onto AWS Marketplace.

Shelly Kramer

>> One of the things that I thought was a really impactful way to start this morning's keynote was when Matt Garman said, "We are at our core a developer community. And we're all about educating and helping that community grow." And I think that really does speak to ... And you can walk around this event. And of course, there's business people and analysts and press and customers and partners and everything else, but there's so many developers here. And developers make the world go round.

Julia Chen

>> They do make the world go round.

Shelly Kramer

>> And so really being passionately committed to whatever can be done to make their work easier. I think that's really exciting.

Julia Chen

>> Absolutely.

Shelly Kramer

>> And super, super cool. So talk with me a little bit about co-selling for AWS partners. How important is that?

Julia Chen

>> It's super important. It's actually one of the reasons why they even partner with a vendor in the first place, right? So I've got a couple statistics here. But we've done a study that has shown that when our partners co-sell with us, there's 51% higher revenue growth. There is 65% higher close rates. There's 54% larger deal sizes. And so on both sides, for the partners and for us, it's really important that we co-sell. It brings the best of their organization and our organization together for our customers. Co-sell is actually so important to us that we have a lot of tools and programs dedicated to co-sell. So one of them is called Partner Central, which is where all of our partners go. We have something called ACE. And in ACE, they're able to share opportunities with us and we're able to share opportunities with them. It's really cool because now we also have a Gen AI tool that allows our internal AWS sellers to discover the right partner to bring in on any given opportunity. So that's something we're really excited about. The other thing that we have is called the Co-Sell Incentive Program. So we actually incent our own sellers to co-sell with some of our qualifying partners. And that gives them a lot of motivation to bring partners into their deals. And so that's how we make sure that co-sell is happening and is healthy and everybody's incented to do it.

Shelly Kramer

>> So what would you ... How would you define the future of partnership here at AWS and within the partner community? And what's your vision for what that future looks like?

Julia Chen

>> So my vision is couple of different things. So Matt Garman did an interview with CRN that showed up yesterday, I think was published yesterday, where he said 100%-

Shelly Kramer

>> .

Julia Chen

>> In 100% of our customer accounts, we want there to be partners, which rings very true for me. So given what I just said about co-sell, I really think that we bring the best to the customer when we go AWS with our partners together. Our partners develop amazing technologies, right? You get the Datadogs and the MongoDBs and the Snowflakes of the world that are building technology on top of AWS. And then you get the Accentures and the Deloittes and the Slaloms and the various other partners as well that are developing all these amazing services that are helping our customers reach that future world that they're trying to get to. So for me, the future of partnership is bringing it all together. It's very nirvana, right? We all co-sell as one big happy family, like many partners together. And really working back from the customer, whatever the customer needs, whether it's the future of supply chain, the future of the hospital, the future of the train station, whatever it is, but building all that back with the best of what we all have together. So it's modernization, right? It's Gen AI, right? It's security. It's bringing all of these things into a solution that ultimately solves what the customer needs.

Shelly Kramer

>> Yeah. Absolutely. Well, what haven't I asked you about that you think is just one of the key takeaways from everything that we ... This fire hose that we've been drinking from today. What haven't I asked you about that you want to be sure we hit on?

Julia Chen

>> I think what's really important for our partners certainly is that we continue to evolve with their feedback, right? So they bring us feedback, they go out there, they work with the customers, they come back. And they're very important feedback providers on both our product, what of the products is working and what of the product is not working, and also how it is to work with us, how we can make it easier for them, how the value exchange can be right. Ultimately, we want it to be effortless to work with AWS, like for our customers as well. So we do a lot of work thinking through that. So that's what I would say on the partner front. Takeaway from re:Invent, I would just say we continue to be builders, right? You had said the developers make the world go round. We totally agree with that. We think the builders ... We call our own employees builders. So we think builders make the world go round. And for us, it's all about making sure that the builders have what they have to reimagine whatever the customer needs at the end of the day.

Shelly Kramer

>> Awesome. There's some very key themes that you see as an observer here. The walking back from what a customer needs and taking this backwards, that's built into Amazon's DNA, right?

Julia Chen

>> Yes.

Shelly Kramer

>> This is how we approach everything. That is very clear a theme here. And another thing that you just touched on, and Matt kicked off this morning by saying that we are passionate about not only partner feedback, but customer feedback and listening to what it is our customers want and need and what they need to be able to scale and drive innovation and things like that. So that customer obsession is just truly so obvious.

Julia Chen

>> Permeates.

Shelly Kramer

>> It really does.

Julia Chen

>> It permeates our culture. And I think it's important because I think as a tech company, it's too easy sometimes to be like, "Look at the widget that I just created," as opposed to saying, "What is the customer trying to solve at the end of the day?" Right? So again, the future of the healthcare system, that's like-

Shelly Kramer

>> Mind-blowing.

Julia Chen

>> Mind-blowing. And it will take a village to do it, but we want to be part of the village, supplying the village, organizing the village, helping with all of that.

Shelly Kramer

>> So great. Well, Julia Chen, thank you so much for spending time with me today. Again, I'm Shelly Kramer from theCUBE Research. Thank you for hopping on theCUBE with me this afternoon.

Julia Chen

>> Absolutely. Thanks for having me.

Shelly Kramer

>> It's been great. re:Invent has been amazing. There's plenty more to come.

Julia Chen

>> And I hope everybody checks it all out. There's so much, like so many cool announcements happening.

Shelly Kramer

>> Absolutely.

Julia Chen

>> Thanks for having me.

Shelly Kramer

>> Thanks for watching.