AWS and InfluxDB – Reflections on re:Invent 2022 Keynote

By Jason Myers / Company, Product, Use Cases
Nov 30, 2022

Amazon re:Invent is a major technology event every year. At this year’s re:Invent, the keynote by AWS CEO Adam Selipsky made a concerted effort to draw connections between technology and some of the key challenges that people around the world, and in some cases beyond the terra firma of Earth, face. While the presentation touched on a wide range of topics, one overarching theme was the intersection of the physical and digital worlds, and the role technology plays in bridging that divide.

Big ideas

The underlying factor of all this is an exponential increase in the amount of data produced by systems and devices. Large data volumes are something we talk about all the time in relation to time series data, but this is also a phenomenon that technology companies see across verticals and use cases. Tangential factors with the increase in the amount of data that applications need to process are reliability and scalability. InfluxDB Cloud automatically scales to meet your storage and compute needs, so you don’t need to worry about the availability of your time series data.

Another point of emphasis in the keynote was having the right tools for the job. It seems that AWS offers a bit of everything, but it’s important to remember that just because AWS offers a lot of services, doesn’t necessarily mean that all their solutions are best in breed. Fortunately, InfluxDB is the best-in-breed solution for time series data. You can see how it compares to Amazon Timestream. Luckily, InfluxDB runs natively in AWS and you can find it directly in the AWS Marketplace, so it plays nicely with that ecosystem and already has several integrations.

Interoperability dovetails with another theme in the keynote: data accessibility. AWS is creating solutions that give a broader range of people access to data as well as the ability to manipulate and work with that data. Our own VP of Engineering Barbara Nelson discussed a similar concept at our recent InfluxDays event, the idea of meeting developers where they are. For us, that means providing the tools and resources that enable developers to work in the languages and environments that are most comfortable to them so they can build awesome things quickly.

Use case highlights

It was interesting to see how the keynote connected these big ideas to use cases on the ground, solving major problems and making a difference. Again, there was a lot of overlap with some of the core use cases where we see people using InfluxDB.

Sustainability – These segments focused on issues like water usage, and energy production and consumption. The company Selipsky highlighted here, Engie, actually uses InfluxDB. In fact, this is an area where InfluxDB has a strong presence, as this type of utility data is inherently time series data. Companies like EnerKey, Vleemo, and Siemens (which Selipsky featured in his Industry 4.0 use case) all use InfluxDB for sustainability use cases.

Security – Security involves more than just keeping bad actors out, but also includes governance and regulation. While Selipsky introduced some new AWS tools in this area, the raw input data that makes those solutions go is time series data. Companies like Aporeto use InfluxDB in their security solutions.

Industry 4.0 – The fourth wave of the industrial revolution is where automated systems being fed and trained data enhance manufacturing processes. This phenomenon manifests in different ways. Selipsky invited Siemens to discuss how they streamline Industry 4.0 processes and applications. The example of coordinating warehouse inventory across locations in real-time clearly relies on time series data. Companies like Prescient Devices, Herrenknecht AG, Algist Bruggeman, and Factry are just some of the many companies that rely on InfluxDB for Industry 4.0 workloads.

Edge Computing – Selipsky’s pitch for Amazon’s Walk Out technology was that it reduced the amount of time you need to wait in line to purchase goods or gain entry to an event. His primary focus here was on the advances AWS made on working with biometric data. But the devices that support this technology are also a great example of edge devices and they need to track the data they collect in the context of time. Working at the edge is often related to Industry 4.0 use cases (like Prescient Devices and Herrenknecht AG) and InfluxDB’s Edge Data Replication feature makes it easy to manage – and gain value from – edge data.

All told, Selipsky’s keynote highlighted the innovative and impressive solutions AWS offers. At the same time, AWS can’t be everything, all the time. That’s why it’s nice to have a best-in-breed time series database option like InfluxDB that plays nicely with the technology environment AWS already has going. So, if you’re an AWS shop and you need to get a handle on your time series data, then look no further than InfluxDB.

You can try InfluxDB Cloud for free.