Amazon will invest 2.5 billion to build its three data centers in Spain

The new AWS Europe (Spain) region will arrive in the coming years, allowing customers to run workloads and store data in Spain and serve end users with even lower latency.

Amazon Web Services, an Amazon subsidiary, will open an infrastructure region in Spain. The new AWS Europe (Spain) Region will consist of three Availability Zones at launch, and will be the seventh AWS Region in Europe, joining existing regions in Dublin, Frankfurt, London, Paris, Stockholm, and the upcoming Milan region launching in early 2020.

It is expected that the Region of Spain to open at the end of 2022 or beginning of 2023 with an investment of about 23 million euros. Currently, AWS provides 69 availability zones in 22 infrastructure regions around the world. With this announcement, AWS has now announced plans for another 13 Availability Zones and four more Regions in Indonesia, Italy, South Africa, and Spain.

“Cloud computing is already driving innovation in companies, educational institutions, public administrations and government agencies throughout Spain, and with this AWS infrastructure region, we hope to help accelerate this transformation,” he stated. Peter DeSantis, Vice President of Global Infrastructure and Customer Support at Amazon Web Services.

"The opening of an AWS region in Spain will drive more jobs and technology businesses, boosting the local economy, while allowing organizations in all sectors to reduce costs, increase security and improve agility. We are very pleased that AWS will contribute to the future growth of Spain," adds DeSantis.

The AWS announcement has been very well received by the acting president of the Government, Pedro Sanchez, who described it as great news for the country. "This investment by AWS will allow Spain to fully adapt to the digital transformation and develop as an international center of innovation and technology. Cloud computing, in addition to promoting technological progress in the private sector, will allow the Public Administration to improve the services it provides to citizens. A secure cloud is an essential tool for the development of our economy, as well as for the generation of employment in our country. We highly value AWS's commitment to the technological development of Spain and the improvement of the qualifications of our citizens."

The addition of the AWS Europe (Spain) Region will allow local customers with data residency requirements to store their content in Spain, safe in the knowledge that they retain full control over the location of their data, while customers who build applications that comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will have access to another AWS secure infrastructure region in the European Union (EU) that meets the highest levels of security, compliance, and data protection.

Today, AWS is also certified National Security Scheme (ENS), which means that its infrastructure meets the highest levels of security and compliance for government agencies and public organizations in Spain. All of this enables Spanish organizations, from startups to enterprises and the public sector, to access their country's infrastructure to take advantage of advanced technologies, including analytics, artificial intelligence, databases, Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, mobile services, serverless services and much more, to drive innovation.

AWS continues to grow in Spain

News of the upcoming AWS Europe (Spain) Region adds to AWS's continued investment in the country. AWS first established its presence in the country in 2012, with the launch of a headquarters AWS Edge en Madrid. This was followed by an AWS office in the city in 2014, which has a large and growing team of account managers, business development managers, customer service representatives, partner managers, professional services consultants, solutions architects, technical account managers, and many more to help customers of all sizes move to the cloud.

In 2016, AWS launched its first AWS Direct Connect, allowing customers to establish a dedicated network connection from their on-premises data centers to AWS. In 2017, AWS delivered an additional Edge and AWS Direct Connect location in Madrid. AWS has also been present in Barcelona since 2018, where a vibrant startup ecosystem thrives and leverages AWS to innovate faster. These investments were made to support the rapid growth of AWS in Spain and around the world.