Show Notes
The Marketplace Moment at re:Invent On opening day of AWS re:Invent 2025, AWS Marketplace is rolling out one of its most significant waves of innovation in years. I sat down with Matt Yanchyshyn, VP of AWS Marketplace & Partner Services, to dig into the new capabilities that simplify discovery, pricing, and deployment - all centered around accelerating time-to-value. As Matt noted, his team has been running at full speed leading into re:Invent. “I like to joke that it’s launch season… there’s a steady stream this time of year” . Inside Partnering is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
AI-Powered Discovery with Agent Mode One of the biggest announcements is Agent Mode, a new conversational discovery experience that uses natural language queries and generative AI to help customers evaluate solutions more efficiently. Matt explained: “We’ve used agents and natural language queries and AI to really simplify the discovery experience.” Customers can upload requirement documents, ask follow-up questions, generate dynamic comparison tables, and receive AI-generated recommendations. Matt described the shift as reducing manual effort across the entire procurement lifecycle - “things that you used to have to do by email or picking up the phone… that’s what we’re automating.” Agent Mode is accessible via the Marketplace website and, importantly, through any MCP-compatible tool. This opens the door for partners and customers to integrate AWS Marketplace discovery directly into their AI agent workflows. Multi-Product Solutions: Solving Real Use Cases Historically, Marketplace listings were single products. Today, AWS is launching multi-product solutions - pre-packaged combinations of SaaS, services, and third-party tools curated around specific customer needs. “This is a big deal because we’ve only had single atomic products so far in the marketplace.” Partners like Presidio are already leading with these unified solution offerings. Early beta participation included more than 40 solutions across multiple partners and use cases, enabling customers to procure and implement complete stacks through a single lead seller. Matt connected this to customer trends: “Customers are asking us for an easier way to discover simplified solutions that solve their use case.” Express Private Offers: Automated Custom Pricing Private offers have long been a major growth driver in AWS Marketplace. This year, AWS introduces Express Private Offers, enabling sellers to pre-define customer qualification criteria and automatically deliver personalized pricing. Matt described it this way: “We’ve automated customized negotiation… issuing the private offer with that custom pricing on the seller’s behalf.” This helps customers bypass lengthy negotiation cycles and allows partners to increase deal velocity, especially for mid-sized transactions that previously required manual back-and-forth. Accelerating Deployment with Quick Launch Plus AWS Marketplace is also tackling a major bottleneck: implementation. Using guided workflows, Quick Launch Plus reduces configuration steps from dozens to just a few. Matt shared an example of CrowdStrike’s next-generation SIEM deployment: “We can take the clicks down from up to 60, down to just a few… setup time down from days or weeks to just seconds.” Combined with IAM temporary delegation, partners can automate resource deployment while customers retain full visibility and control. As Matt put it: “It doesn’t just end at subscription - we’re focused on the deployment part as well.” Meeting Customers Wherever They Already Work Last year, AWS launched “Buy wit AWS” where customers, partners, and AWS could deploy AWS Marketplace widgets in context for their customers to buy directly from the AWS Marketplace. This year, the team is expanding Marketplace presence in many more “in context” sites across AWS - in particular, embedding Marketplace into AWS se
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For partner leaders, one of the hardest questions isn’t identifying your best-performing partners. Most organizations already know who they are. The harder question is: Who should you invest in next? That question sits at the center of my conversation with Kenneth Fox, CTO and founder of ChannelScaler. Kenneth has spent his career in channels and partnerships, and his perspective combines the technology side of partner management with the practical realities of running partner programs. Inside Partnering is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
At Sage FUTURE in San Francisco, I sat down with Dan Miller, EVP of Financials and ERP at Sage, to talk about how Sage is thinking about AI, ecosystem partnerships, and the future of ERP platforms. One of the clearest themes from the conversation was this: finance leaders are not resisting AI. They simply want transparency, accountability, and confidence in the outputs. For partner leaders, ISVs, and ecosystem builders, that creates a very different opportunity than the generic “AI transformation” messaging dominating the market right now. Dan framed it around trust. “What finance and operations professionals really want is confidence in the tools that they’re deploying are doing exactly what they are expected to do.” That requirement shapes how Sage is building both its AI capabilities and its broader partner ecosystem. Inside Partnering is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
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At Sage FUTURES in San Francisco, Gretchen O’Hara delivered a clear message to partners: the market is shifting fast - and the opportunity is massive. But despite the noise around AI, one thing hasn’t changed. Partners are still at the center of how businesses win. “The channel is one of the most important things because our partners are the ones that have the deepest industry expertise and are closest to customers that can really solve their unique, unique business challenges.” AI may accelerate execution, but it doesn’t replace the need for domain expertise, customer proximity, and trusted advisory. In fact, it amplifies it. Inside Partnering is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.