For the past 5 years, Magento Innovations Lab has been encouraging developers and Magento community members to share new ideas, experiment with new technologies, and improve existing features. The core purpose of this experimental lab is to recognize outstanding developers and their contributions to the Magento platform.

In 2020, Magento Innovations Lab partnered up with AWS (Amazon Web Services) in order to further expand opportunities for community members. Michele Miller, Adobe’s Senior Manager of Solutions Innovation, stated that “The Magento and AWS developer communities are both expansive, passionate, and driven towards improving online shopping experiences for merchants of all sizes.” Partnering with AWS gives developers new features that go beyond the limits of what’s possible through the Magento platform alone.

Benefits of Partnering with AWS

The worldwide Magento community has always been passionate about delivering excellent products, collaborating with other developers, and striving to further improve the platform. According to Miller, one of the top priorities for Magento Innovations Lab in particular is to “instill a culture of innovation” among developers. Now armed with a wide range of helpful tools from Amazon, Magento users can try features such as:

• AWS Rekognition: This simple, user-friendly API is a visual search tool that can quickly analyze images or videos stored in Amazon S3.

• Machine Learning: With Amazon Personalize, developers with no previous machine learning (ML) experience can easily create personalized experiences for individual customers.  
• Amazon Forecast: This tool allows developers to combine time series data with additional variables to create accurate future forecasts.
• Voice Commerce: Amazon’s Alexa can assist with tasks related to voice search, product comparisons, order statuses, and more.

AWS Resources

Whether you’re new to Magento or have been a community member for years, you’ll be excited to know that Magento’s partnership with AWS includes greater access to valuable resources. From developer guides to tech support, you can learn new skills, collaborate with others, and study technical documentation for a variety of applications. Here are just a few advantages of the ongoing partnership:

• Easy access to AWS developer guides. 
• Free AWS developer accounts to registered partners and community developers.
• Ongoing tech support.
• Hosted office hours on Wednesdays.

To see some of the amazing things the community has already created, you can check out the Magento Innovations Lab showcase here!