A big part of my role is to support Irish start-ups with the AWS Activate programme. There’s a couple of common questions I often get asked so I thought the best idea would be to put together a short guide on what to consider.
Before you get into all the small print, three important questions, is your start-up under ten years old, are you at series A or before funding and are you working with an official AWS partner?
Who fits this criteria and is eligible for credits?
Here are some example cases:
You are an Irish technology start-up, you’ve engaged with Enterprise Ireland, you recently got PSSF funding and you established the business two years ago.
You are an technology Irish start-up, you recently completed funding from Delta Partners* and Elkstone*, the business was created in 2020.
You are an early stage technology company and were accepted onto the NDRC accelerator.
*These are two examples but AWS have an Activate credit campaign partnership with most VC investors. Just ask your for investor for their code.
Who doesn’t fit this criteria?
You are a business in existence since 2013, you haven’t received funding from a VC or enterprise Ireland.
You are a business started in 2012, you raised a series B round last year.
You already got applied for and redeemed 100k.
I heard I may be available for some AWS Activate credits but what are they?
Not every company is going to need Activate credits. Some companies may be eligible for them through their partner but there might not really be a need for them for their company. You might have a highly successful coffee shop in Dublin, you have a website, you sell a few dozen bags of coffee on your eCommerce site also. You’re probably not going to need Activate credits.
In the case of a start-up that knows they’re going to need them, what are Activate credits and what are the services they’re most likely to need?
Activate credits simply are credits for the usage of most AWS cloud computing services. There are some exceptions such as AWS marketplace and Mechanical Turk which are not covered by Activate credits.
The 3 most popular AWS services are:
EC2: Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) is a web service that provides secure, resizable compute capacity in the cloud. An EC2 instance is simply a virtual server in Amazon Web Services terminology. It is designed to make web-scale cloud computing easier for developers. Amazon EC2's simple web service interface allows you to obtain and configure capacity with minimal friction.
Typical Usage: Software as a service (Saas) logic, Batch processing of data, Machine Learning and High-Performance Computing
Amazon RDS: Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) is a web service that makes it easier to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the AWS Cloud. It provides cost-efficient, resizable capacity for an industry-standard relational database and manages common database administration tasks.
Typical Usage: E-commerce data storage, Content Management systems for WordPress, Web Applications.
Amazon S3: Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) is an object storage service that offers industry-leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance. You can use Amazon S3 to store and retrieve any amount of data at any time, from anywhere.
Typical Usage: Backup and Storage of other files and elements (Logs, virtual images, DB backups), Big Data analytics, Web hosting, Media hosting
Here are some of the more commonly asked questions that we receive:
Where do I find out how much I am spending?
The main service in your AWS console where you can have a centralize view of all your expenses is AWS Billing and Cost Management. From this console you would be able to dive into the Cost Analysis section and see the expenditure on all the services you are using, as well as a forecast of the cost for the month based on your usage.
Another useful feature that can be found on this service is AWS Budgets. This tool allows you to set up alarms for different ranges, from alerting you when you are going over the free tier of AWS services to set up a specific expenditure amount per month. Once the limit of the budget is getting close, you will receive a message on the provided emails, as well as being able to configure it for more complex communication. after that you will receive another communication when you have reached the budget.
Budgets on their own don’t stop the usage of services or the cost, if you reach the limit of the budget the usage will continue unless you do take action and pause resources.
How can I cost optimise?
There are multiple factors that can be use on the cost optimization, AWS has a whitepaper, part of our wider Well Architected Framework, that focuses on cost optimization and explores best practices and concepts when building your workloads on the cloud. With that said, a very common first step on cost optimization is the usage of Saving Plans and Reserved instances instead of using services on-demand.
AWS Savings Plans offer a way to reduce AWS costs by committing to a consistent amount of compute usage for a 1 or 3-year term. There are two types: Compute Savings Plans, offering flexibility across compute services (AWS Lambda, AWS Fargate and EC2) and regions, and EC2 Instance Savings Plans for specific instance families. These plans automatically apply to eligible usage, providing cost savings over on-demand rates.
AWS Reserved Instances (RIs) provide a discount compared to on-demand pricing in exchange for committing to a specific instance type and usage (e.g., region, term length) for a 1 or 3-year period. Ideal for steady-state workloads, RIs help reduce costs by allowing upfront, partial upfront, or no upfront payment options, automatically applying the discount to matching instances.
How can I start checking my security on the cloud?
The AWS Shared Responsibility Model divides security obligations: AWS secures the infrastructure, while customers are responsible for securing their data and applications. With this perspective, AWS encourages it’s customers to follow best practices compiled in the Security Pillar of the Well Architected Framework. However, AWS has identify that Startup customers have a limited amount of resources and not all the items on the Pillar can be implement. For this reason the AWS Startup Security Baseline (AWS SSB) was created, allowing Startups to have more clear and startup-friendly approach to security on the cloud.
Can I get support from AWS?
To obtain AWS support, sign up for one of the AWS Support Plans: Basic (free), Developer, Business, or Enterprise. Each plan offers progressively more comprehensive assistance, including 24/7 access to technical support, guidance, and resources. Simply choose the plan that fits your business needs through the AWS Management Console to start receiving support tailored to your AWS journey.
What is “Infrastructure as Code (IaC)” and how I can use it?
Infrastructure as Code (IaC) is a practice where you manage and provision computing infrastructure through definition files, rather than configuring it through the console or the CLI manually. This approach enables you to automate the setup and maintenance of infrastructure, ensuring consistent and repeatable environments. You can use IaC by adopting tools such as AWS CloudFormation or AWS CDK, which allow you to define your infrastructure in code. This code can then be versioned, shared, and reused, making infrastructure management more efficient and error-proof.
What if I have more questions? I’m wondering how do I sign up for Activate, how do I apply for credits, how long does it take to process applications for credits etc?
Check out this Frequently Asked Questions section on the Startup Loft website for the answers to all these questions.
Update: Here’s a quick video I made on the short simple process for applying for credits.