how can e-⁠residents get a free aws well-architected framework review (wafr)?

This guide, by Marketplace member Cloudvisor, an Advanced Tier AWS Partner, explains what AWS WAFR is, the benefits for e-⁠residents, and how to get one for free

For e-⁠resident startups, leveraging cloud computing platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers numerous advantages. With cloud infrastructure, you can access powerful IT resources without investing in expensive on-site equipment, allowing you to scale up or down as needed to match your business performance.

The AWS Well-Architected Framework provides guidelines for building on AWS most effectively and efficiently as possible, ensuring that your cloud architecture follows best practices. However, it can be challenging to determine whether your infrastructure complies with the best AWA practices on your own.

That's where the AWS Well-Architected Framework Review (WAFR) comes in. WAFR is a process of evaluating the architecture of your AWS workloads against best practices outlined in the AWS Well-Architected Framework. The WAFR process helps you identify any potential issues or risks in your architecture and provides guidance on how to make improvements to better align with the 6 pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework – operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, cost optimization, and sustainability.

E-resident startups using AWS may qualify for receiving a free WAFR from Cloudvisor, an e-Residency, Marketplace member, and an official AWS Certified Partner. In this article, we’ll go over all aspects of the review, its use, and its benefits, and discuss how you can get this review done for free! If you're also interested in finding out whether your startup qualifies for AWS credits, read our previous blog article.

What is the AWS Well-Architected Framework? 

The AWS Well-Architected Framework is a valuable tool for anyone looking to design and run workloads in the cloud. With its focus on key concepts, design principles, and architectural best practices, the Framework offers a comprehensive guide to building robust, scalable, and cost-effective systems on AWS. 

The 6 Pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework

Let’s have a look at each pillar of the Well-Architected Framework separately: 

1. Operational Excellence – The operational excellence pillar is concerned with the operation and monitoring of systems, as well as the continuous improvement of processes and procedures. Automating changes, responding to events, and setting standards to govern everyday operations are all subjects of concern here.
2. Security – The security pillar is concerned with safeguarding data and systems. As well as data confidentiality and integrity, controlling user permissions, and setting controls to identify security incidents.
3. Reliability – The reliability pillar is concerned with workloads fulfilling their intended duties and how to swiftly recover from failure in order to satisfy demands. This pillar also covers concerns about distributed system design, recovery planning, and adjusting to changing requirements.
4. Performance Efficiency – The pillar of performance efficiency focuses on allocating structured and streamlined IT and computing resources. Also, selecting resource types and sizes that are optimized for workload requirements, monitoring performance, and preserving efficiency as business demands change.
5. Cost Optimization – The pillar of cost optimization focuses on eliminating unnecessary expenditures. It encompasses understanding expenditure over time, controlling fund allocation, selecting the proper type and quantity of resources, and scaling to meet corporate objectives without overspending.
6. Sustainability – The sustainability pillar focuses on addressing the long-term environmental, economic, and societal impact of your business activities. This pillar aims to help users understand their impact on the environment, establish sustainability goals; anticipate and adopt new, more efficient hardware and software offerings; and reduce the downstream impact of the cloud workloads.

The Well-Architected Framework is regularly updated by AWS to meet the dynamic nature of industry trends, and emerging security threats which is why conducting the review on existing systems has many benefits, which we will be looking at in the next section. 

What are the benefits of an AWS Well-Architected Framework Review?

By undergoing a WAFR, you can ensure that your cloud infrastructure is secure and reliable in the long run. Plus, you can save time and money, enabling you to focus on other critical projects within your organization. Additionally, you can even get the review done for free, further benefiting your e-⁠resident startup. Overall, the main benefits of AWS WAFR include:

• Identifying any gaps or issues and finding better solutions to problems that may come up in the future.
• Stay up to date with the AWS best practices.
• Identifies unnecessary costs in your cloud infrastructure.
• Better performance & reliability of your applications running on AWS.
• Your infrastructure will be more secure and better positioned to deal with any security threats (old and new).
• Provides a consistent framework to quickly deploy applications into your AWS environment.

Get a free AWS Well-Architected Review

Businesses having a deeper understanding of the WAFR process may opt to perform the WAFR themselves; however, given the complex nature of AWS and its underlying technologies, it’s always better to ask for help from Amazon Certified Partners such as Cloudvisor. We have the expertise and necessary tools to scan infrastructure thoroughly and prevent any overlooked errors.

The best part is that Cloudvisor can conduct the review and remediate the issues free of charge since AWS itself would be covering the expenses. You won’t need to pay anything in advance - once the review is completed, we will receive a coupon from AWS that serves as a payment for our work during the review and remediations.

What are the steps for conducting an AWS well-architected review?

Typically, a WAFR takes about one calendar month to complete, although there may be slight variations depending on each specific case. The general process of a WAFR looks something like this:

1. You book a free consultation with one of our AWS experts to see if WAFR is the right choice for you.
2. We begin with a kick-off meeting, where we define expectations and get to know you and your needs (30 min).
3. Then we begin the assessment by doing a long call with your technical team and going through the questions in the Well-Architected Framework Tool (up to 4 hours).
4. We deliver a Well-Architected Framework Review Report with our findings and an improvement plan that highlights high-risk issues that should be addressed ASAP (up to 1 week).
5. We help you remediate the selected high-risk issues, either via the IaC, manual changes, or by providing detailed instructions (2-3 weeks).

Feedback from an e-⁠resident-founded company

E-resident-founded software development company ITRAYS has chosen Cloudvisor as their trusted AWS Partner. By leveraging Cloudvisor's expertise, they have been able to enjoy multiple benefits of AWS for startups. With Cloudvisor's ongoing support and guidance, they are getting the most out of AWS, while significantly lowering their overall costs!

Here’s what they have to say about Cloudvisor:

Takeaways

An AWS Well-Architected Framework Review can give your business the edge it needs to succeed by ensuring your systems are optimized, secure, and maximized for optimal performance.

The Cloudvisor team can conduct an AWS Well-Architected Review for free for all clients and implement the recommended changes as well. This enables you to sleep soundly, knowing that your business is doing everything it can to make the most of its AWS solution.