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Anyone here who left fed job and regretted it?
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It can be fairly complicated, but it basically boils down to fair competition and anti-corruption laws as defined in the FAR. The federal governmenr has to find the "best value" or "lowest price technically acceptable" to procure a solution or service, this is typically defined in the request for proposals. Technically speaking, to procure something directly from AWS without competing the opportunity, the federal agency would have to develop some kind of justification for avoiding a competition. The justification has to state specifically why AWS is the only product that will work for them, and why other products like Google and Microsofts cloud offerings are insufficient. This can be a lot of work, and could possibly be rejected by the contracting office.
Federal Agencies like to avoid competition where possible. Its easier, and faster to procure products and services. Less risk of protests and ending up in the news. In order to do this, the govt establishes massive contracts with companies to procure a wide range of products and services. But the federal government is a collection of different companies essentially, and not everyone wants the same thing. So they can't just set up a contract for cloud and give it solely to AWS, because other Agencies may want to procure from Google or from Microsoft. And it would be an incredible lift to establish individual contracts with each of these providers, and structure them in a way to guarantee each major provider wins one contract.
So companies like carahsoft exist. Carahsoft holds massive contracts with the federal government that enables them to procure products directly for the federal government. Want AWS? Negotiate with carahsoft who will work with AWS to provide a price (essentially AWS price + 2-6% on top). Want Adobe Acrobat Pro? Go to Carahsoft. Want Office 365 + Adobe Acrobat Pro + Tableau? Carahsoft got you, its a one stop shop for everything you need.
A common misconception is that AWS is sharing a portion of the profit, or passing the BD cost to Carahsoft. This isn't true. Its actually the opposite, the federal government is paying for the convenience of avoiding a competition. This is within reason of course, there are still laws against price gouging and regulations that guide "fair and reasonable" / "best value" offerings that carahsoft must adhere to.
Mentor
AWS is basically outsourcing their BD function for a cut of the profits. It also gives AWS access to contract vehicles and 8(a) ops they wouldn’t have otherwise.
This is a great question, never understood why companies like carahsoft exist, if I understand correctly they do reselling just like you described above but I have no idea why they are necessary. Commenting to follow.
You can go direct or sub with AWS
So why doesn't everyone just go directly to AWS? Seems like a win win for the buyer and aws by cutting out the middleman
Thank you very much, this was very helpful for me.