Amazon Web Services NZ country manager Tiffany Bloomquist says New Zealand has enormous potential to become a global digital leader by leveraging technology to grow our economy and increase export earnings.
Amazon Web Services NZ country manager Tiffany Bloomquist says New Zealand has enormous potential to become a global digital leader by leveraging technology to grow our economy and increase export earnings.
From FemTech to culturally aware AI, Amazon Web Services (AWS) NZ country manager Tiffany Bloomquist makes her predictions for 2024.
What would you rate as your greatest success?
I started my career in construction following in the footsteps of my father who was a builder. I spent time working onthe North Slope of Alaska on the oil pipelines and for an electrical company building data centres and learning project management skills. My transition from that to technology, and then to scale to work with people from around the world is a real privilege that I am grateful for every day. Today, I’m still a builder of kinds, with a focus on developing the next generation of cloud builders who will lead Aotearoa’s digital transformation.
What’s the worst mistake you have made in business?
Not moving fast enough to seize opportunities. In a former role, I led a team that was passionate about developing the most innovative solutions, but were highly averse to experimentation and taking risks because they feared failure. Our proposals to customers weren’t competitive because of this and we missed opportunities. It took a few years to change the culture and mindset, and to trust each other to embrace risky bets. It’s actually part of why I joined AWS. We have a very peculiar, ‘startup’ culture, and experimentation and risk taking is valued.
At re:Invent this year, I watched Amazon’s chief technology office Werner Vogels make his annual technology predictions for the year ahead. I was really inspired by his four predictions: GenAI becoming culturally aware, femtech [technology to boost women’s healthcare] finally taking off, AI assistants redefining developer productivity, and education evolving to match the speed of tech innovation. Just as humans learn from discussion, debate, and the exchange of ideas, large language models need similar opportunities to expand their perspectives and understand culture. As they do, they will gain a more nuanced understanding of societal challenges, and these advances will see more robust and technically accurate responses across a broad range of topics. This will have a profound effect on our communities in New Zealand and positively benefit generations to come.
What are your hopes for the new government?
New Zealand has enormous potential to become a global digital leader by leveraging technology to grow our economy and increase export earnings. Cloud already supports every critical industry in NZ and can improve healthcare outcomes, drive research and scientific discovery, and help address labour shortages and workforce upskilling. We see great opportunities for the new government to embrace these opportunities by leveraging cloud, including AI; AWS is proud to support this through our $7.5 billion investment to build data centres in Aotearoa, which will create approximately 1000 new jobs. We also have a memorandum of understanding with the Government to train 100,000 people in New Zealand over five years, and to progress public sector innovation, the digital economy, and cybersecurity and sustainability initiatives.
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This year has been tough for many businesses, with inflation and interest rate rises squeezing revenue and profits. AWS is built for years like this. We’ve spent a lot of time this year helping customers improve productivity with generative AI or GenAI, which can transform not just customer interactions, but whole industries. It’s inspiring to see customers like Xero, One NZ, Soul Machines, and local startups like mental health AI provider Clearhead leverage GenAI to improve customer service outcomes and operational efficiencies. We’re only starting to see the potential for GenAI, and I expect this will quickly evolve next year as new services like our AI-powered assistant, Amazon Q, are embraced by businesses.
What will be your biggest business challenges in 2024?
It’s been great to see Kiwi companies embrace the innovation that cloud and AI offers, however, to become a leader in the digital economy, and to support the pace of digital transformation in New Zealand, we need a highly skilled, robust workforce who can support this. This will continue to be a challenge for the industry, and is why we make significant investments to upskill Kiwis. In addition to our commitment to train 100,000 New Zealand people over five years, we also offer over 600 free courses through our AWS Skill Builder digital learning centre, as well as free and low-cost generative AI skills courses for learners of all technical levels. Locally, AWS offers programmes like AWS re:Start with Te Pūkenga, Indigtech, and Hāpori Wāhine, targeted at upskilling underrepresented groups such as Māori and Pasifika, and women in technology.
What opportunities do you see in 2024?
I’m excited about the many new AI services that are available. We’ll start to see offerings that allow us to spend more time on what we are best at, and less time on the routine work. There might even be interesting use cases that help to simplify our lives while we’re enjoying the summer holiday.
Great Barrier Island. This will be my first visit, and my family and I are really looking forward to it. I have two young boys, and I can’t imagine a more quintessentially New Zealand spot to unplug for a while to relax, explore the beaches and enjoy Aotearoa’s natural beauty.
A scene from Lessons in Chemistry (Apple TV+).
What series will you be streaming?
Probably Lessons in Chemistry. I’ve read the book and I’m hoping it translates beautifully to the screen. It tells the story of a 1950s chemist who gets fired and uses her background in science to become a beloved cooking show host.
What would you recommend as a good book to read over summer?
One of my favourite non-fiction books is Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. He expanded my view on our journey as humans, covering biology, history and economics. From a business perspective, I would strongly recommend Working Backwards by Colin Bryar on how to push decision-making to the edge of your organisation and empower employees with ownership for their work.
For fiction, I’m a big fan of science fiction and fantasy, and although there is an abundance to choose from, my all-time favourite is epic world-building novels like Ender’s Game, The Stand, Lord of the Rings and Dune. Most recently, I read Fourth Wing and Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros. If you dive in, prepare yourself for dragons, magic and romance!
