Amazon's AWS commits $1 billion toward new unit for embedded AI engineers
Amazon said on Tuesday it is creating a new division under its Amazon Web Services cloud unit employing so-called forward-deployed engineers who embed with customers to help them more quickly and efficiently adopt artificial intelligence software.
The company is committing an initial $1 billion to the initiative with the goal of sending five to six pods of engineers to customers for 45-day periods, said Francessca Vasquez, AWS vice president of frontier AI engineering and services.
"We have a ton of demand for customers who are asking for our help to really drive agentic AI patterns in their workflows," said Vasquez, in an interview prior to the announcement. Forward-deployed engineers are versatile workers who embed directly alongside clients, navigate internal politics and write production-grade code to help make models deliver results.
Amazon is a bit late to the party. Palantir Technologies has had its own forward-deployed engineering unit for well over a decade and others such as Salesforce, Anthropic and Google Cloud also offer their own versions of the service.
Forward-deployed engineering is a rare bright spot among tech companies that have been cutting jobs amid the rapid expansion of AI. Box CEO Aaron Levie said in a LinkedIn post in May that forward-deployed engineers are "about to become one of the most in-demand jobs in tech." And from 2023 to 2025, demand for forward-deployed engineers and similar roles grew 42-fold, according to a LinkedIn report earlier this year.
The company is committing an initial $1 billion to the initiative with the goal of sending five to six pods of engineers to customers for 45-day periods, said Francessca Vasquez, AWS vice president of frontier AI engineering and services.
"We have a ton of demand for customers who are asking for our help to really drive agentic AI patterns in their workflows," said Vasquez, in an interview prior to the announcement. Forward-deployed engineers are versatile workers who embed directly alongside clients, navigate internal politics and write production-grade code to help make models deliver results.
Amazon is a bit late to the party. Palantir Technologies has had its own forward-deployed engineering unit for well over a decade and others such as Salesforce, Anthropic and Google Cloud also offer their own versions of the service.
Forward-deployed engineering is a rare bright spot among tech companies that have been cutting jobs amid the rapid expansion of AI. Box CEO Aaron Levie said in a LinkedIn post in May that forward-deployed engineers are "about to become one of the most in-demand jobs in tech." And from 2023 to 2025, demand for forward-deployed engineers and similar roles grew 42-fold, according to a LinkedIn report earlier this year.
Next Story
