What You Should Know:
– Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced its commitment of $20 million and the launch of the Diagnostic Development Initiative to support customers who are working to bring better, more accurate, diagnostics solutions to market faster and promote better collaboration across organizations.
– With the assistance of AWS, customers can accelerate diagnostic research, innovation, and development to speed our collective understanding and detection of COVID-19 and other innovate diagnostic solutions to mitigate future infectious disease outbreaks.
– The AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative includes participation from 35 global research institutions, startups, and businesses focused on tackling this challenge.
Amazon Web Services (AWS), today announced the launch of a $20 million dollar AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative to fight against the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19). The AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative will accelerate diagnostic research, innovation, and development to speed the collective understanding and detection of COVID-19 and other innovative diagnostic solutions to mitigate future infectious disease outbreaks. Funding for the initiative is will be provided through a combination of AWS in-kind credits and technical support to assist AWS customers’ research teams in harnessing the full potential of the cloud to tackle this challenge.
AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative Overview
Better diagnostics will help accelerate treatment and containment, and in time, shorten the course of this epidemic. The AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative includes participation from 35 global research institutions, startups, and businesses focused on tackling this challenge.
The program will be open to accredited research institutions and private entities that are using AWS to support research-oriented workloads for the development of point-of-care diagnostics (testing that can be done at home or at a clinic with same-day results). Approved proposals will be notified via email within 45 days after submission, and required to provide a valid AWS Account ID, which is not part of consolidated billing or reseller accounts. Given the need, the emphasis initially will be on COVID-19, but we will expand to other infectious disease diagnostic projects in the near future.
AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative Technical Advisory Group
The AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative also includes the counsel of an outside technical advisory group consisting of leading scientists, global health policy experts, and thought leaders in the field of infectious disease diagnostics. This advisory group will help set the initiative’s priorities, help us innovate ways to enable participants to securely share critical research findings and foster better dialogue between our customers and qualified external organizations who may be working independently to solve similar challenges.
“The world needs more and more private sector innovation to combat this pandemic. Amazon’s commitments and participation are very welcome, particularly since the lack of significant next-generation diagnostic tools remains a large gap in most health systems. A platform to link research, digital capabilities, and new products to customers globally is an exciting venture,” says Steve Davis, member of the World Health Organization’s Digital Health Technical Advisory Group and a member of the AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative’s technical advisory group.
