The Amazon Web Services Inc. Marketplace provides a digital catalog where AWS cloud computing customers can comparison shop and purchase software to run on AWS.

Now eight years old, Marketplace has matured to offer 8,000-plus listings to over 300,000 active customers. But, until now, one important feature had been missing.

“If you’re an [independent service vendor] you might want to package on something like an installation service, training services or a bespoke statement of work that goes along with your technology,” said Chris Grusz (pictured, right), director of business development, AWS Marketplace, Service Catalog and Control Tower at Amazon Web Services Inc.

Grusz and Matthew Polly (pictured, left), vice president of worldwide business development, alliances, and channels at CrowdStrike Inc., joined Lisa Martin, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, during AWS re:Invent. They discussed the launch of Professional Services in AWS Marketplace. (* Disclosure below.)

Seamless product and service procurement on AWS Marketplace

The inability to offer services via Marketplace created friction by forcing customers to complete transactions outside Marketplace, which was unacceptable for a company whose trademark is customer delight. Solving this is Professional Services in AWS Marketplace, which was announced during the AWS Partner Summit at re:Invent 2020.

The function accelerates and smooths the purchase experience by allowing customers to buy services from ISV partners and resellers within Marketplace.

“They just submit a private offer to that customer, and they can upload a statement of work,” Grusz said. “If that customer accepts, it goes directly on their AWS bill.”

CloudStrike was one of the 100 partners on board for the launch. The end-point cybersecurity provider now offers customers the ability to package professional services with their cybersecurity solutions via Marketplace.

Cloud Security Assessment is one of the services CloudStrike is offering through AWS Marketplace. The global pandemic has both increased the number of companies adopting cloud at speed, and the number of workers accessing secure systems outside the safety of a central office environment. These companies need to understand how to maintain the proper security posture for those cloud environments, according to Polly.

In a security assessment, the CloudStrike Professional Services team will go in and check configurations, look for unmanaged accounts running in AWS that could represent a security risk, and make recommendations on how a company can improve the overall security posture of its cloud environments.

“It is about streamlining the procurement,” Polly stated. “Offering customers the ability to acquire through the AWS Marketplace, whether that’s the CloudStrike product or the CloudStrike service offering.”

Grusz added: “While there are a lot of products that you can just ‘point, click and go,’ there is a lot of technology that does need to have some kind of handholding. Launching Professional Services offering opens up the aperture in terms of the selection we can bring into the catalog.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of AWS re:Invent. (* Disclosure: The AWS Partner Network sponsored this segment of theCUBE. Neither AWS nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.) 

Photo: SiliconANGLE