Amazon Web Services opens Pop-up Loft for Startups in the UK  

Amazon Web Services (AWS), is taking the AWS Pop-up Loft program global with the opening of an AWS Pop-up Loft in London on September 10, 2015. This is the first international AWS Pop-up Loft to open this year, joining similar Lofts located in San Francisco, New York City, as well as an upcoming Loft planned in Berlin, and is a place where developers, engineers, entrepreneurs, and tech enthusiasts can get the in-person help and guidance they need to build on AWS or to build their startup. Visitors can participate in training courses, boot camps, self-paced labs, meetups, and other special events, or they can just grab a coffee and work on their app in the open office space, all at no charge. The AWS Pop-up Loft, London will be open from September 10 to October 29 between 10am and 6pm, later for evening events, Monday through Friday, in Moorgate. Visitors can go online now at http://awsloft.london, to make one-on-one appointments with an AWS expert, register for boot camps and technical sessions, and learn more about other opportunities.

The AWS Pop-up Loft London is another way that AWS is helping local startups, such as SwiftKey, and Citymapper to grow their businesses. Today, more than two thirds of the UK’s startups with valuations of over a billion dollars, including Skyscanner, JustEat, Powa, Fanduel and Shazam, are leveraging AWS to deliver innovative services to customers around the world.

“The UK is a hotbed of innovation and London is one of the main places where we see talented, ambitious entrepreneurs coming together to test ideas and start new businesses that leverage cloud computing,” said Werner Vogels, CTO and Vice President, Amazon.com. “With the AWS Pop-up Loft in London we will be bringing together a host of AWS resources, and some of the brightest and most creative minds in the industry, to help startups across the UK. We look forward to working alongside the next generation of UK businesses and helping them to reach their full potential.”

For nearly a decade, AWS has actively supported the UK startup community. AWS counts some of the most well-known startups in the UK as customers, such as Mendeley, Playmob, Yoyo Wallet, and GoSquared.

GoSquared is a startup created by a group of friends when they were just 14 years-old to provide powerful customer analytics services to some of the world’s largest companies such as Jaguar Land Rover, ESL Gaming, and Post.nl. “Building our business on AWS has enabled us to scale and grow incredibly quickly,” said Geoff Wagstaff, CTO and co-founder, GoSquared. “We are constantly looking to ship new features and improvements to add value for our customers and having this additional access and face time with the technical experts behind AWS is invaluable. We are looking forward to spending time in the AWS Pop-up Loft in London.”

Hailo is a UK-based startup that has grown rapidly and seen international success. Hailo, built entirely on AWS, allows passengers to hail a cab within minutes via a mobile app, and first launched in London in 2011. “We built our business on AWS and everything we do is in the cloud,” said Feidhlim O'Neill who is the VP of Platform & Technical Operations at Hailo. “We look forward to presenting at the AWS Pop-up Loft when it opens, sharing some of our experiences of growing an international business on AWS and some of the advice we would give to other startups on the same journey we were on only a few years ago.”

YPlan, is an event discovery and ticketing platform. Their apps have been downloaded more than 1.5 million times in its main markets of London, New York and San Francisco. "Fundamental to our growth and success has been access to training on AWS,” said Viktoras Jucikas, Co-Founder and CTO, YPlan. “We take every opportunity to make sure our developers continue to learn. When you have grown as quickly as we have, getting hands on with latest innovations is a competitive advantage.”

The AWS Pop-up Loft in London will feature:
· Ask an Architect: Customers can make an appointment or just drop in to meet one-on-one with an AWS solutions architect to discuss technical questions about their AWS architecture, AWS technologies and features, cost optimization, and more by visiting: http://awsloft.london.
· AWS Technical Bootcamps: These one-day training sessions, taught by experienced AWS instructors and solutions architects, give customers hands-on experience using a live environment with the AWS Management Console.
· Self-paced Hands-on Labs: For beginners through advanced users, these labs help sharpen AWS technical skills at a personal pace and are available for free in the Loft during operating hours.
· Technical Sessions: AWS solution architects, product managers, and evangelists will cover tech topics on AWS for mobile and gaming, databases, big data, compute and networking, architecture, operations, and security. AWS customers, partners and industry thought leaders will also host evening sessions to share their insights and experiences.
· AWS Customer and Partner Presentations: The startup community will also hear from customers, Venture Capitalist and Incubators, such as Seedcamp and Techstars, to learn what it takes to get funding. Startups will also get the opportunity to connect directly with some of the most important people in the London startup ecosystem.

The AWS Pop-up Loft in London is supported by Intel and Chef.
AWS and Intel share a passion for innovation, and have a history of helping startups be successful. At the AWS Pop-up Loft, Intel will host talks and demonstrate the latest Intel technologies, such as the Internet of Things products and recent advancements with Intel® Xeon® processors.

“The opening of the AWS Pop-up Loft in London will provide a great opportunity for startups to receive deep technical guidance and hands-on experience working with the latest Intel and AWS technologies,” said Patrick Bliemer, Managing Director, Intel Northern Europe. “The startup community is a fundamental driver of technology innovations fuelling the rapid growth of the digital services economy. Intel is excited to be working closely with AWS on the AWS Pop-up Loft program to help enable environments around the world where users have access to the tools and expert guidance they need to bring new ideas and innovations to market.”

Chef, an IT automation company that helps enterprises configure and deploy IT infrastructure and applications in the data centre and the cloud, is joining forces with the AWS Pop-up Loft to bring its DevOps expertise to the AWS Pop-up Loft in London through hosted sessions and training curriculum.

“AWS broke new ground with the first Pop-up Lofts in the US. Chef has participated in the two US-based Pop-up Lofts and recently spoke at the San Francisco Loft to a standing-room only crowd of practitioners, underscoring the insatiable demand for new IT skills in the era of the cloud. We are expecting the same kind of response in London as we’re seeing rapid adoption of DevOps throughout Europe,” said Justin Arbuckle, Chief Enterprise Architect and Vice President of EMEA, Chef. “Chef and AWS are redefining how the next generation of businesses operate and we are thrilled to help empower developers and IT professionals to thrive in this new world.”