AWS offers $1B credit to slash Uncle Sam's cloud bills - and lock in as a provider until at least 2028
(2025/08/07)
- Reference: 1754596959
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/08/07/gsa_signs_1b_deal_with_aws/
- Source link:
The US government is about to get more AWS in more places thanks to a new $1 billion deal between Uncle Sam and Amazon.
The US General Services Administration shared news Thursday of an agreement with AWS to provide federal agencies with credits, available through December 31, 2028, that they can use for cloud adoption, training, and other things the government needs to do to "move from aging on-premises infrastructure to the cloud," according to the GSA.
"Through this new agreement with AWS, federal agencies will be able to enhance delivery of critical services, leverage cloud and advanced AI technologies, and dramatically reduce costs," acting GSA administrator Michael Rigas said of the announcement.
[1]
The AWS agreement announced on Thursday is the latest deal under the [2]OneGov purchasing strategy, which the GSA announced in April. OneGov aims to eventually reshape how government agencies buy all their goods and services, with the first phase of the program focusing on IT products - like cloud platforms provided by AWS.
[3]
[4]
OneGov, the GSA said in April, largely operates under the philosophy of eliminating isolated purchases in favor of large, government-wide agreements for goods and services with standardized terms and pricing. Eliminating the need to negotiate terms for each purchase means a lot less government time and money spent on acquisitions.
The GSA has announced a number of OneGov contracts since April, including a deal signed last month to [5]deeply discount Oracle tech for government buyers and provide [6]$1 access to ChatGPT Enterprise for agencies. Like this deal, the Oracle and OpenAI OneGov agreements open acquisitions up to the whole of the federal government.
[7]US agencies log nearly 9x more GenAI use cases in 2024 - but deployments stall
[8]Anthropic tries 'to enable beneficial uses' of AI by government agencies
[9]OpenAI cozies up to Uncle Sam with ChatGPT government edition
[10]Governments cling to private cloud despite inexorable public cloud adoption
As with those other agreements, the AWS OneGov matter sees the Amazon cloud arm opening its services to whichever federal government customers come calling, but in this case by using "incentive credits" that will be "aggregated across Federal civilian agencies," according to the GSA.
Agencies that acquire incentive credits through the GSA can use them to purchase things like AWS cloud services, infrastructure and application modernization services, migration assistance, and training credits. The deal also allows for "streamlined engagement" between AWS and federal agencies "with greater savings for direct contracts."
[11]
AWS' push into federal government cloud computing couldn't come at a more opportune time, either. ProPublica recently exposed Microsoft for [12]using Chinese workers to support US government Azure customers after Redmond spent years [13]courting the feds .
We asked the GSA if there was any connection between the Microsoft news and the AWS announcement, but we didn't hear back by publication time. ®
Get our [14]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://www.gsa.gov/about-us/newsroom/news-releases/gsa-unveils-onegov-strategy-04292025
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/08/gsa_oracle_deal/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/06/google_openai_anthropic_us_gov_ai_deal/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/29/us_government_identified_ai_use/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/06/27/anthropic_claude_government/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/28/openai_us_government/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/04/public_sector_private_cloud/
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/28/microsoft_china_staffers_us_govt_cloud/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/20/microsoft_azure_government_cloud/
[14] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
The US General Services Administration shared news Thursday of an agreement with AWS to provide federal agencies with credits, available through December 31, 2028, that they can use for cloud adoption, training, and other things the government needs to do to "move from aging on-premises infrastructure to the cloud," according to the GSA.
"Through this new agreement with AWS, federal agencies will be able to enhance delivery of critical services, leverage cloud and advanced AI technologies, and dramatically reduce costs," acting GSA administrator Michael Rigas said of the announcement.
[1]
The AWS agreement announced on Thursday is the latest deal under the [2]OneGov purchasing strategy, which the GSA announced in April. OneGov aims to eventually reshape how government agencies buy all their goods and services, with the first phase of the program focusing on IT products - like cloud platforms provided by AWS.
[3]
[4]
OneGov, the GSA said in April, largely operates under the philosophy of eliminating isolated purchases in favor of large, government-wide agreements for goods and services with standardized terms and pricing. Eliminating the need to negotiate terms for each purchase means a lot less government time and money spent on acquisitions.
The GSA has announced a number of OneGov contracts since April, including a deal signed last month to [5]deeply discount Oracle tech for government buyers and provide [6]$1 access to ChatGPT Enterprise for agencies. Like this deal, the Oracle and OpenAI OneGov agreements open acquisitions up to the whole of the federal government.
[7]US agencies log nearly 9x more GenAI use cases in 2024 - but deployments stall
[8]Anthropic tries 'to enable beneficial uses' of AI by government agencies
[9]OpenAI cozies up to Uncle Sam with ChatGPT government edition
[10]Governments cling to private cloud despite inexorable public cloud adoption
As with those other agreements, the AWS OneGov matter sees the Amazon cloud arm opening its services to whichever federal government customers come calling, but in this case by using "incentive credits" that will be "aggregated across Federal civilian agencies," according to the GSA.
Agencies that acquire incentive credits through the GSA can use them to purchase things like AWS cloud services, infrastructure and application modernization services, migration assistance, and training credits. The deal also allows for "streamlined engagement" between AWS and federal agencies "with greater savings for direct contracts."
[11]
AWS' push into federal government cloud computing couldn't come at a more opportune time, either. ProPublica recently exposed Microsoft for [12]using Chinese workers to support US government Azure customers after Redmond spent years [13]courting the feds .
We asked the GSA if there was any connection between the Microsoft news and the AWS announcement, but we didn't hear back by publication time. ®
Get our [14]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://www.gsa.gov/about-us/newsroom/news-releases/gsa-unveils-onegov-strategy-04292025
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/08/gsa_oracle_deal/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/06/google_openai_anthropic_us_gov_ai_deal/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/29/us_government_identified_ai_use/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/06/27/anthropic_claude_government/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/28/openai_us_government/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/04/public_sector_private_cloud/
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aJUh8xQsUo37S8glt1tHkAAAANU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/28/microsoft_china_staffers_us_govt_cloud/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/20/microsoft_azure_government_cloud/
[14] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/