AT&T and Amazon deepened their long-standing work with the carrier linking more of its internal operating systems onto Amazon Web Services (AWS) and outbound connectivity to Amazon’s Leo satellite play, with AWS in turn tapping AT&T’s rapidly expanding fiber footprint to boost cloud connectivity.

The multifaceted agreement includes AT&T migrating workloads from several of its current on-premises technologies to an on-premises, managed-cloud iteration of AWS Outposts. AT&T will use AWS’ Professional Services, Amazon Q Developer, and AWS Agentic Services to push that migration.

AWS’ various managed and distributed hybrid infrastructure offerings – which includes Outposts, Local Zones, Regions, and Wavelengths – have been touted as industry leading by research firms such as Gartner.

AT&T noted that it expects the move to “improve its resilience posture due to improved infrastructure management and faster modernization of business support systems.”

That expectation is further bolstered by AWS using AT&T's extensive fiber network to connect AWS data center locations. That footprint was recently enhanced by AT&T closing on its $5.75 billion purchase of Lumen Technologies mass-market fiber operations that extends AT&T’s current fiber footprint to 32 million locations.

“By pairing our expanding fiber infrastructure with AWS’ cloud capabilities, and through our collaboration to deliver the infrastructure of the future by connecting data centers, we’re creating a more resilient, scalable, and intelligent connectivity ecosystem,” AT&T Business SVP for Product Shawn Hakl noted in a statement.

Satellite broadband opportunities

AT&T will also use the Amazon Leo low-Earth orbit (LEO) constellation to provide satellite-based “fixed-broadband” connectivity to business customers “in areas where such services are needed.” The deal expands AT&T’s satellite-based broadband options.

The carrier late last year touted plans to begin offering a satellite-based broadband service during the first half of this year that would ride on AST SapceMobile’s recent successful launch of its latest BlueBird communications array into low-Earth orbit. That satellite is designed to use traditional cellular spectrum that allows it to support services on already released cellular devices.

AT&T is one of a handful of cellular operators that have struck deals to provide some of their spectrum license assets to AST SpaceMobile and in turn lease capacity from those satellites.

Amazon’s Leo is now in that mix.

The Amazon Leo service, which was rebranded from its Kuiper effort to Leo last November, is Amazon’s long-gestating plans to offer satellite-based broadband services to rival the likes of SpaceX and AST.

That recent rebranding was quickly followed by the launch of an enterprise-grade satellite terminal capable of supporting download speeds of up to 1 Gb/s. That device includes the ability to transmit data directly using the satellite constellation via AWS’ Transit Gateway or Direct Connect Gateway platforms.

AT&T’s expanding satellite-based broadband opportunity comes on the heels of CEO John Stankey throwing shade toward the commercial viability of such offerings. Stankey recently told attendees at an investor conference that while he continues to think there is a place for a space-based communication service, physics will prevent such a venture from being able to support a direct competitor.

Stankey specifically pointed to limitations with “upstream bandwidth,” which “becomes more important in the AI dynamic.”

“It’s inherently going to be a more fragile upstream uplink than what you're going to get in a terrestrial network that gets on fiber really quickly,” Stankey said of a satellite upstream connection. “The faster you can get something on fiber, the more robust that upstream uplink is going to be, and the more low-band spectrum you have to do that, the more robust that upstream link is going to be. Satellite doesn't have those things.”

AT&T’s work with AWS has substantial history, including a deal nearly 10 years ago that spanned cloud networking, IoT, security, and analytics. That work has continued over the years, including a deal announced just a few weeks ago to offer AT&T’s Connected Spaces IoT platform via the AWS Marketplace.

The companies said they plan to show more of their latest partnership at the upcoming MWC Barcelona event. This will include how AT&T is combining Outposts with generative AI-powered automation tools and AWS’ Transform to support the project migration.