Around this time of year, people start talking about “the holiday season.” Sure, Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, New Years and more are all around the corner. But for AWS folks, there’s another exciting event to celebrate: AWS re:Invent.

As AWS’s annual conference, re:Invent is our chance to come together as a community. It’s a jam-packed week to hang out with 50,000 of your closest AWS friends, catching up and networking and learning and listening and partying and walking all over the city and every once in a while, even sleeping. It’s a blast, and we can’t wait. 

What is the CloudFix team most excited about at AWS re:Invent 2023? Here are five reasons we can’t wait to put on that badge.

1. Memorable keynotes

Some conferences feature different keynote speakers every year, which is a great way to hear a variety of people and perspectives. AWS, on the other hand, favors continuity, with consistent presentations from its leadership team. While this may sound boring, especially for those of us who have gone many years in a row, it’s anything but. Hearing from the same people gives us context and an idea of what to expect. For instance:

  • CEO Peter DeSantis always makes me walk away thinking, “Wow. EC2 is so cool.” This year I’m excited to hear him talk about Nitro, the custom hardware that runs EC2, as well as Graviton and the new types of hardware support for AI and machine learning. 
  • Werner Vogels, CTO, is clever. He’s funny. He’s colorful. His last keynote was him in “the Matrix” but the Matrix was a land of synchronous communication. His point was that the world is now asynchronous, but he made it with characteristic flair. 
  • Dr. Swami Sivasubramanian is the academic. In addition to having a very similar surname to my good friend, livestream cohost, and CloudFix CEO Rahul Subramaniam, he always presents fascinating information about everything from databases to the connections between our minds and AI.
  • Adam Selipsky’s speeches give me hope for the future. His big-picture thinking inspires optimism and excitement. I’m looking forward to hearing more about AWS’s environmental initiatives from Adam this year.
  • Dr. Ruba Borno is the relative newcomer to the bunch, having given her first AWS keynote last year. It’s clear she has a huge amount of industry experience and knowledge and it will be interesting to hear her take on AWS’s channels and alliances.

2. Exciting announcements

Keynotes, of course, aren’t just about the people giving them – they’re AWS’s platform for its big announcements. I’m especially excited to hear how AWS is innovating around their CPUs. I bet we’ll get some updates around Graviton and the special purpose Trainium/Inferentium (or, colloquially, AWS Silicon).

What else are the CloudFix team and I watching out for? End user computing is an area of interest, specifically around facilitating remote work and security. We’ll also be listening keenly for news about Cloud Intelligence Dashboards and will definitely be paying close attention to Compute Optimizer announcements. Here’s Rich Ochs, AWS Senior Manager of Cloud Optimization, talking about Compute Optimizer in a recent AWS Made Easy livestream:

All about Compute Optimizer with Rick Ochs (AWS)

One more thing to keep an eye on: AWS is now a member of the FinOps foundation. I’m curious if/how they will incorporate that into their messaging and programming. 

3. The Expo

I love a good conference expo. It’s like a giant tech buffet! Companies are putting their best feet forward, investing time and effort into their booths, demos, presentations, and more. It’s an incredible opportunity to very quickly meet a lot of people and learn about the companies they represent. It also makes those learnings personal. Things that are boring over email – “can you send over some more information about your product?” – become far more compelling when you’re talking to real people. 

The Expo is an excellent networking platform as well. You can easily set up meetings with people within an organization, meet people with common interests, and get to know the competition. It’s the perfect chance to get your name and face out there if you’re looking for a job, too. 

It isn’t just third parties, either. AWS is there with their Builders Lounge, Training and Certification Lounge, the Community Developer Lounge, the Builder’s Fair… there is so much to do, you could easily spend a day or two just in the Expo.

Learn more about the Expo here.

4. Connecting with friends and colleagues

Speaking of networking: the social aspect of AWS re:Invent is a huge part of what makes the event so special. Not only can you meet new connections, you get to see and engage with people from across your network. Old colleagues, current colleagues you’ve never met in person, acquaintances from previous positions… re:Invent brings so many people together. We spend so much time working, it’s inevitable that our work associates become our friends, and re:Invent is like one big backyard BBQ. 

In the wise words of Creed:

Whether you’re at re:Invent or following along from home, follow the #reinvent and #reinvent2023 hashtags on your favorite social networks. And if you are there in person, there is no harm in reaching out! The AWS Village in the Expo is a good place to meet.

5. Livestreaming from the event

Finally, I’m personally excited to bring our livestream, AWS Made Easy, to re:Invent this year. We’ll be streaming every morning at 6am, Mon-Thurs, as well as delivering a special “closing party” episode on Thursday afternoon. We’re especially excited for the lineup of guests on the Thursday afternoon wrap-up show – and they seem excited too! You can catch that episode here on LinkedIn and here on YouTube. 

Each episode lets me and Rahul discuss the latest announcements, summarize the keynotes, synthesize what we’ve heard and learned, and get perspectives from AWS experts, employees, and users alike. We’re putting a lot of effort into producing a high-quality stream and I like to think that it shows. I’m very much looking forward to being the “eyes and ears” for anyone and everyone who is interested in what’s going on at re:Invent 2023, whether you’re in Vegas or not.

Stephen's Stream Deck

Whatever your reasons are for looking forward to AWS re:Invent this year, I hope you have a fun, informative, interesting, and successful event. Feel free to stop by and say hi – CloudFix will be at booth #1529. See you there!