AWS CEO: Companies Zero In on Most Valuable AI Applications

Two years into the generative artificial intelligence (AI) boom, CEOs and chief information officers are looking to focus on the use cases that deliver the best return on investment, Amazon Web Services (AWS) CEO Matt Garman told The Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

Garman said that “almost every” one of these executives has done at least 100 proofs of concept and now aims to focus on five or fewer that are most valuable, according to an interview posted Monday (Dec. 2) by the WSJ.

On Tuesday (Dec. 3), Garman will deliver a keynote address at the annual AWS re:Invent conference and will share “real, needle-moving changes” among the company’s offerings in AI and computing, he said, per the interview.

Garman became CEO of AWS in June and the keynote he delivers will be his first in that role, according to the report. The re:Invent keynote typically includes announcements of many new features and products being introduced by Amazon’s cloud unit.

Recent developments highlighted in the report include AWS’ investment of another $4 billion in AI startup Anthropic, bringing its total investment in the company to $8 billion; Anthropic’s uses of Amazon’s in-house AI chip, Trainium; and Amazon’s plans to spend over $100 billionover the next center on data centers — an amount that’s higher than that the company will be spending on its eCommerce warehouses.

The AWS Trainium chips are designed to be cost-effective for AI training and will help lower the cost of AI, thereby helping boost the ROI for companies, Garman said, per the report.

In the first news announcement to come out of its re:Invent conference, AWS said Sunday (Dec. 1) that it has made new generative AI enhancements to its cloud contact center solution, Amazon Connect. These enhancements allow users to segment their audience to deliver personalized and timely communications, improve the self-service experience with a generative AI-powered assistant, add customizable AI guardrails and gain AI-driven insights to help managers improve service quality.

On Monday, AWS announced that automaker Lotus chose it as the company’s preferred cloud provider, AWS and Orbital Materials partnered to develop new data center decarbonization and efficiency technologies, and Oracle Database@AWS is available in limited preview.

For all PYMNTS AI coverage, subscribe to the daily AI Newsletter.