# AI is accelerating the move of core workloads to the cloud

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/ai-is-accelerating-the-move-of-core-workloads-to-the-cloud/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Matt Garman](https://realalpha.app/builders/matt-garman/) · Matt Garman is CEO of AWS.
- Host: [Alex Heath](https://realalpha.app/people/alex-heath/) · Founder & host, Sources · Left The Verge to start Sources in 2025; it has made over $1M since, mostly from sponsors.
- Show: Sources
- Episode: [AWS CEO Matt Garman on building a $1 trillion business](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/), Nov 10, 2026
- Moment: 2:21 to 5:18 of the episode (3 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/ai-is-accelerating-the-move-of-core-workloads-to-the-cloud/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=141

## Quote

> “they weren't going to get the benefit of AI if they didn't get those **workloads in the cloud**”
> — [Matt Garman](https://realalpha.app/builders/matt-garman/) at [3:13](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=193) · Sources

## Takeaways

1. Agents need access to data across a company's systems.
2. On-prem workloads can block companies from using AI effectively.
3. AI is speeding up migrations that used to be planned slowly.

## About this segment

Matt Garman says companies need cloud-based access to their data and systems to get value from AI agents. That shift is speeding up cloud migrations and reinforcing AWS growth.

From “AWS CEO Matt Garman on building a $1 trillion business”, Nov 10, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[2:24](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=144) And I would say over the last two years, really what we've gotten excited about is this flywheel where customers now see that there is a massive opportunity that AI affords them to gain efficiencies, to build new businesses, to create new customer experiences, to rethink how work gets done, to build faster for customers. And they don't get that benefit if their core workloads aren't in a cloud environment.

[2:49](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=169) If they're running in an on-prem database, if they're running in an on-prem mainframe server, if they're in a VMware cluster in their legacy data center, they just have a hard time having agents talk to those pieces, pulling data from all those different data stores. It doesn't work. And so what we've actually seen is customers already saw benefits of the cloud. There's cost improvements. There's agility improvements.

[3:11](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=191) There's a reason why the AWS business has been growing great for the last 20 years, but it really accelerated when people realized they weren't going to get the benefit of AI if they didn't get those workloads in the cloud, those core workloads as part of it. So we've actually seen our core business really accelerate over the last couple of years. And the more core workloads get in the cloud, the more they can actually take advantage of AI.

[3:33](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=213) And so there's this real positive flywheel effect where actually the revenue growth that we're seeing is significantly accelerating. And I think that's just further bolstered our confidence in the growth of AWS. I think the other things that we're seeing is just what's possible. I think a couple of years ago, you saw incredible content generation. You saw incredible conversational chatbots being made.

[3:58](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=238) And then as we moved into worlds of agents where work was really done, we're now just seeing customers really scratch the surface of what's possible, where you have a fully autonomous agent taking advantage of what we see are really powerful models out there that can run longer and longer and do harder and harder things. And they're really starting to think about and see how core parts of their workloads can be automated, improved, and built upon. And that opens up effectively all of the things that enterprises do. And it opens up the pie for everyone. It's not like you're taking from where they used to spend over A and bringing it to It's actually creating new businesses, creating new revenue streams for our customers.

[4:37](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=277) And they're seeing cloud as a way to get to those places. And so we see that growth across tens of thousands of different startups, enterprises, large companies. And so when we see that growth where we see companies just really getting, scratching the surface of the benefit that they're getting, and we're seeing this flywheel effect, it gives us a lot of confidence that there's a huge amount of business going forward for us.

[5:02](https://realalpha.app/v/1C_MErgk2Z0/?t=302) for us. And, you know, it's far from certain. We've got to do a lot of execution. There's a lot of invention. There's a lot of things that we need to do between here and there. But the opportunity and the space for us to go after and help customers go and grow and take advantage of