How to Choose an AWS Migration Partner - Boutique vs SI, In-House vs Outsourced, and What Each Costs

This guide is for CTOs, engineering leads, and founders who are comparing ways to get onto AWS and want a straight answer on cost and fit rather than a sales pitch. If you already know you want to run the numbers on the migration itself, see our AWS migration cost calculator. For the end-to-end process, see the complete AWS cloud migration guide.

The real decision: partner vs in-house team

Before comparing partners against each other, decide whether you need a partner at all. This is the “AWS partner vs in-house migration team” question, and it comes down to total cost of ownership, not day rate.

When in-house wins

• You are migrating continuously (not a one-off) and will keep evolving the platform for years.
• You already have 2+ engineers with real AWS depth (not just certification).
• The workload is your core product and you want the knowledge to stay in the building.

When a partner wins

• The migration is a one-time or infrequent event - hiring permanent senior cloud engineers for a 3-month project is expensive and slow.
• You need it done in weeks, not after a 2-3 month hiring cycle plus ramp-up.
• You want AWS funding: MAP and PoC funding require an AWS Partner to submit the application. An in-house team cannot access it directly.

The TCO comparison people miss

For a one-time migration, a partner is almost always cheaper after MAP funding than hiring - and months faster. For a permanent platform you keep changing, in-house ownership wins on the multi-year horizon. Many teams do both: a partner runs the migration and trains the in-house team who then own the run phase. See our migration guide for how a handover-focused engagement is structured.

Global SI vs boutique partner

If you have decided on a partner, the next fork is a global systems integrator versus a specialist boutique. Both can be AWS Partners; the difference is structure, not badge.

Neither is “better.” A global SI is the right call for a 200-application, multi-year enterprise programme that needs deep bench, formal governance, and a name the board recognises. A boutique is the right call for a startup-to-mid-market migration that needs senior engineers moving fast without six-figure minimums and layers of process. The common trap with a global SI is paying architect rates for junior delivery; the common trap with a boutique is engaging one without enough bench for a very large parallel programme. Ask directly who will be on the keyboard.

The questions that actually reveal a good partner

Day rate tells you almost nothing. These questions do:

• “Who specifically will do the work, and how senior are they?” Ask for the names and the seniority mix on your project, not the company average.
• “Do you submit AWS MAP / PoC funding for us, and have you done it before?” A real AWS Partner does this routinely. Vagueness here is a red flag - it is worth 70-80% of the fee.
• “What happens after cutover?” A migration that lands and then abandons you in week two is worse than no migration. Ask about the run/optimisation phase and knowledge transfer.
• “Show me a comparable migration you delivered and what went wrong.” Everyone shows wins. A partner who can talk candidly about a hard cutover is one who has actually done it.
• “Is the architecture documented as code (Terraform/IaC) that we own?” If the environment only exists in someone’s head or console, you are locked in.
• “How do you handle our compliance requirements?” For regulated workloads (SOC 2, ISO 27001, FCA, HIPAA), the partner should speak fluently about controls, not treat it as an add-on. See our ISO 27001 on cloud guide.

How partner pricing really works

The headline day rate is the least useful number. What determines your actual cost:

• MAP funding changes everything. AWS covers 70-80% of qualifying partner engagement costs. A €92,000 project can net out to €18,000-28,000 out of pocket. Only an AWS Partner can submit this - it is the single biggest lever on price. See the detail in our migration cost calculator.
• Seniority mix, not headline rate. A boutique charging a higher day rate but staffing two senior engineers often costs less in total than an SI blending five people where three are juniors learning on your budget.
• Scope discipline. Fixed-scope, outcome-based engagements protect you from the open-ended time-and-materials creep that inflates large-SI programmes.
• The run phase. Cheap migration + expensive or absent post-cutover support is a false economy. Price the first 6 months of operation, not just the cutover.

For the underlying migration numbers by company size, the cost calculator breaks down one-time project cost and ongoing AWS spend for startup, mid-market, and enterprise.

Specialist scenarios where fit matters most

Some migrations have a specific shape that narrows the field:

• Heroku / PaaS → AWS. Look for a partner who has done PaaS-to-hyperscaler moves specifically - the gotchas (managed add-ons, dyno-to-container mapping, connection pooling) are particular. See migrating from Heroku to AWS.
• Database-heavy (Oracle → PostgreSQL, legacy SQL). This needs DMS/SCT depth, not generalists. See our Oracle to PostgreSQL guide.
• Regulated / security-first. Compliance evidence should be a first-class output of the migration, not bolted on later.
• Large portfolio (100+ apps). This is where a global SI’s bench and governance genuinely earn their premium - or a boutique that can prove parallel-wave capacity.

Frequently asked questions

Talk to a boutique AWS partner

We are a boutique AWS partner - senior engineers, MAP funding handled for you, and a run phase after cutover rather than a disappearing act. If that fits your migration, see our cloud migration services or consulting. If you are a large enterprise with a 100+ application programme, we will tell you honestly whether a global SI is the better fit for your scale.