Upskilling Asia Pacific to stay competitive in the digital economy

November 28, 2022

Andrew Sklar

Over five million people trained in cloud skills by AWS across the region since 2017

The pace of digital transformation happening across Asia Pacific (APAC) is as exciting to witness as it is to support. However, rapid technological changes are contributing to a widening digital skills gap that must be addressed to unlock the region’s full economic potential, especially in the face of challenging economic times. To prepare for the challenges in 2023, it is more important than ever for governments, industry, and education institutions to work together to make skills training a priority.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is focused on helping close the skills gap, and today we are excited to announce that we have trained over 5 million people across APAC with cloud skills since 2017. While we’re proud to reach this important milestone, our work doesn’t stop here. We are deeply committed to our training mission and we know reskilling and upskilling will make workers more efficient, organizations more productive, and economies more robust in the coming year.

As more organizations move their IT infrastructure to the cloud to become more productive, we expect the adoption of cloud computing, machine learning, data analytics, and cybersecurity across every industry will fuel a vast number of new jobs and contribute to economies of all sizes. These technical roles across our customers and partners are crucial to helping organizations remain competitive and productive as the global economy cools.

Cloud technology is helping organizations become more productive too. Research by AWS Cloud Economics shows that AWS customers in APAC – across commercial and public sectors – who migrated to AWS are seeing an acceleration in innovation, with an approximate 28% reduction in time-to-market for new features and applications, and about a 40% increase in employee efficiency.

Upskilling the existing workforce at scale

Technology makes innovation possible, but it’s people who get the work done. Research from AlphaBeta, commissioned by AWS, shows that all workers stand to benefit from digital skills training. Non-tech workers report benefitting from greater efficiency (88%), increased promotion opportunities (62%), and improved employability (76%). Most tech workers also benefit from greater efficiency (86%), increased salary (76%), and greater job satisfaction (82%).

For organizations looking to accelerate cloud transformation to become more productive, AWS Skill Builder Team subscription builds on our existing Skill Builder platform of 500+ free, self-paced, digital courses. This subscription service provides access to exclusive and highly interactive AWS cloud training. Many of the courses are available in Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, and simplified and traditional Chinese.

Additionally, we heard from customers that they need training content tailored to specific industry needs. AWS Industry Quest, which launched today at AWS re:Invent, provides the solution. As part of the paid digital subscription, AWS Industry Quest uses interactive, game-based learning to help learners and organizations build industry solutions on AWS. The first version is focused on the financial services industry and helps professionals learn and build solutions for fraud protection, grid computing for capital markets, serverless checking accounts, and more. National Australia Bank (NAB) signed up as our global beta customer.

For organizations that are looking for something beyond a do-it-yourself approach and require a program designed in collaboration with AWS, we offer AWS Skills Guild – a comprehensive cloud skills training program tailor made for an organization’s unique skilling needs. And, we have seen some great results!

With nearly 5.4 million customers to serve, Techcombank, one of Vietnam’s leading commercial banks, has been leveraging AWS Skills Guild training to upskill its employees. With high customer demand for digital products, convenience, and security, the bank is focussed on fostering a culture of innovation and building a workforce that can drive its digital and cloud transformation ambitions. Techcombank has made self-paced cloud skills training available to all employees. AWS instructors have run over 100 live training classes and helped upskill 2,800 employees and executives to date. We salute Techcombank for closing its own digital skills gap.

AWS Partner and India’s leading technology services and consulting company, Wipro Limited, is embarking on its new Skills Guild program called Step Up. Wipro’s goal is to create a culture of continuous learning and upskill all employees with cloud skills so they can deliver better outcomes for clients. Step Up will significantly increase the number of Wipro employees with AWS Certifications too.

Paytm, one of India’s largest digital payments, commerce, and financial services platforms, is meeting its cloud-talent needs with the support of AWS Training. The company realized it needed a focused and structured approach to train employees on AWS. To achieve this, Paytm engaged with AWS to establish a Cloud Center of Excellence (CCoE) team as a central governing body. The program will upskill more than 2,800 Paytm IT personnel by end of 2022.

Singapore’s Singlife with Aviva (Singlife) is going all-in on AWS by the end of 2023. With AWS, Singlife has built a digital-first customer service model to empower more than 1.5 million customers in Singapore and the Philippines to attain financial well-being. AWS has developed a tailored training program for Singlife, which includes hands-on AWS Jam sessions where employees experience game-based learning.

Building a diverse talent pool

Industries and governments can build a diverse talent pool by developing micro-skills training courses that help workers upskill quickly, find employment, and bridge skills gaps to drive economic growth.

AWS re/Start is our free 12-week program that helps unemployed and underemployed individuals with little to no tech experience build entry-level cloud computing skills and get connected with employers. To date, we’ve launched AWS re/Start in Australia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam. Eric Relleve’s life and career did a 180-degree turn after joining AWS re/Start. Based in the Philippines, Eric quit his previous job and was unemployed for a while, but he was determined to pursue a career in tech. After graduating from AWS re/Start he got a job as a Cloud Engineer at Fujitsu. Globally, the program connects over 98% of graduates with job interview opportunities and Eric’s story is testament to that.

AWS re/Start graduates from Indonesia

Our free AWS Laptops for Builders program, which is unique to Indonesia and supported by the Indonesian government, is introducing high school and vocational students – including those with disabilities – to basic cloud skills in Bahasa Indonesia. AWS is working with local organizations Sagasitas and Nahdatul Ulama to deliver this cloud education program to prepare students for tech and cloud computing careers. It will ultimately support Indonesia’s digital transformation and help communities across the archipelago thrive.

image of Laptops for Builders participants

Laptops for Builders learners in Indonesia

Nurturing the talent of the future

We’re also on a mission to create equitable learning opportunities for our diverse population in APJ and make them accessible to all. AWS Academy provides higher education institutions with free, ready-to-teach cloud computing curricula that prepare students to pursue industry-recognised AWS Certifications and in-demand cloud jobs that will advance economies throughout the region.

AWS Educate provides individuals as young as 13 free, self-paced training resources to build cloud skills on demand. Learners can access hundreds of hours of training and resources in English, simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.

In Vietnam, we are working with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to help modernize the curricula of the country’s top seven universities. AWS is providing technical support and educator training to integrate cloud content into their degree courses.

NAB Innovation Centre Vietnam (NICV) Funnovation Day, in Vietnam

In Singapore, AWS is collaborating with Skilio – a skills-based hiring platform – to help graduates with their tech job search. We’re also supporting Singapore Management University’s ‘Women in Tech’ group by offering cloud essential knowledge and skills for women and girls to be successful in the digital workforce.

Making innovation possible despite economic headwinds

With the skills gap widening and the global economy slowing, employers must urgently upskill and reskill their workers. We will continue to invest in our training programs to meet the growing demand for skills in cloud computing, machine learning, and other emerging technology that will help our region weather financial turbulence.

AWS remains deeply committed to working alongside governments, institutions, and industries to boost digital capabilities and help close the skills gap by offering a broad range of training solutions that work for every learner. Despite the economic headwinds, working together, we can ensure workers become digitally-savvy to help drive business growth and make everyone a part of securing our region’s continued prosperity.