Simone Brunozzi » singapore

Working for Amazon.com in Asia!

simone — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 06:42:15 +0000

As you know, I work for Amazon.com, as a Technology Evangelist, Amazon Web Services, AsiaPacific.
I can say that it’s a really exciting company to work for, and especially in the Cloud Computing business, these are very exciting days!

If you’re interested in working for Amazon.com in Asia (in most cases, based in the beautiful city of Singapore), check out the open positions we have: Amazon Web Services, Singapore and Asia Pacific.
As you can see, there are many: some technical ones, such as Solutions Architects or Data Center experts, or some sales-related ones, such as Regional Sales Manager, Account Manager, or ISV/SI Sales Manager. Most of them are related to a specific market in Asia, being India, Australia, China, Korea, Singapore, or other ASEAN Countries.

If you find a job opening that fits your profile, you can either:
1) Apply directly for the job; OR
2) Contact me, and we can briefly discuss it (simone at amazon dot com)

Please remember that I cannot discuss internal details, e.g. how the selection process works, and such. However, I can take a look at your profile, and help you determine if you are a good fit for the job.
You might also want to take a look at these blog posts:
How I got hired by Amazon.com;
The official Amazon Web Services blog;
This nice presentation: Introduction to Cloud Computing and Amazon Web Services, plus demo (remember to download the PPT to read the notes); also, if you like it, please share it on Facebook and Twitter, I’d appreciate that :)

A Sakura story

simone — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 02:19:11 +0000

I really like Lynn’s Blog, A Sakura Story.
Lots of pictures, comments, thoughts, on how it is to live in Singapore, and visit nearby countries.
Very cool read.
I also like that she’s often involved with volunteer work, and that’s admirable.

During her stay in Nepal, for eight days Lisa and I took care of three lovely kittens (one of the many other volunteer things that Lynn does), which will soon be adopted by some lucky person in Singapore.
Here you can see them: Panza, Macchietta and Noia, while we try to cook them :)

I’m on ping.sg

simone — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 02:24:34 +0000

A blog aggregator for blogs that talk about Singapore.
simonebrunozzi’s Profile on Ping.sg

Entrepreneurship in Singapore

simone — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 05:32:55 +0000

I moved to Singapore in January 2010. It has been nine months now, and I can finally say that I know Singapore “a bit”.
Today, on “Today” free newspaper, they write an article called “Challenge for Singapore is to grow pool of entrepreneurs: MM Lee“.
Minister Mentor Lee is the founding father of Singapore.
And he’s right. It’s a challenge.
This is what he said during the Russia-Singapore Business Forum yesterday: “We’re largely Chinese and Indians. Both Chinese and Indians, the best go into Government, they don’t go into enterprise.”

I think he’s right, and I also think that this problem is easily fixable: give an INSTANT Visa to any graduate from selected Universities that requests it, or from any US/EU University, or from specific nationalities (EU/US/Iceland/Switzerland/Russia/Australia/New Zealand) to start with.
You might ask them to pay, say, 2,000 SGD (Singapore Dollars), or 5,000 SGD, if you think that too many people are going to apply. Or give it for free to the first 10,000 applicants.

That’s an easy way to increase the non-Indian and non-Chinese population, and bring more entrepreneurship in Singapore.
Otherwise, these people will look somewhere else, and go somewhere else.

Simple things work better.

As an off-topic, I’d also like to mention something else that MM Lee said, answering the question “Are you happy?”: “A person who’s happy all the time, I think won’t make much progress”.
Not true. I’ll explain in a longer post on happiness.

Linchpins are everywhere, even in Singapore

simone — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 07:21:13 +0000

Tonight, Monday June 14th, I’ll be at the local “Linchpins are everywhere” Meetup in Singapore, organized by myself.
30 people are expected to show up!

Everything has been inspired by this blog post by Seth Godin.
If you’re curious about the name, “Linchpin” is his new book.
If you’re in Singapore… Come!

Early Singaporean experiences

simone — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 06:31:30 +0000

I was expecting Singapore to be efficient, smart, lean. It is.
Yesterday I had my appointment at the Government offices to get my employment pass.
Appointment was at 10:30. I arrived at 10:20. A gentle lady welcomed me, brought me to one of the electronic kiosks, she bar-scanned my documents, the machine printed a number with my name on it; I sat down for a few minutes, and then my name was called. The very nice lady at the counter, Lisa, helped me with my stuff, had me sign just once, and everything was all set at 10:40. Impressive.

My passport-size pictures were not ok, since my glasses were covering part of my eye. I walked 20 meters on the same floor, get into the print office, get my new pictures in about 4 minutes, and came bank.
I exited the building at about 10:50.

I had another appointment at the bank (to setup a bank account), and it was smooth as well. I subscribed a phone contract with SingTel, where they give you 500 minutes, 500 sms, 12 GB of traffic per month, and a new iPhone 3Gs 32 GB, for the monthly price of about 98 S$ (Singapore dollars). Not bad.
Then I had lunch with some italian friends.
Yes, Singapore is efficient.
On sunday I took the subway, stopped at Bugis, bought some vegetables, and visited the japanese barber shop, where they did a perfect haircut for 10 S$, while I was reading SuperFreakonomics on my Kindle :)

Have a nice sunday, dear reader! Catch up with you soon :)