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What is the criteria to apply for AWS Activate?

Your startup must meet the following eligibility criteria:

• Must be Series A or earlier. Startups can be unfunded or funded, up to and including pre-seed, angel, seed, debt finance, and series A only.
• Must be founded within the last 10 years. Startups that were founded more than 10 years ago are not eligible for Activate.
• Must have an active AWS account. If a startup does not yet have an AWS account, they can open one for free here.
• Must have an Organization ID. Your startup needs to have access to StartUp Bahrain’s unique OrgID in your application.

What’s the full list of add-on perks we could get through AWS Activate?

All eligible startups will have access to exclusive offers which can be found in the Activate Console once you’re approved and logged in.

• 90%~ off HubSpot for 1 year
• $2,000 in Airtable credits
• Free Auth0 for 1 year
• $50,000 in Twilio Segment credits
• $1,000 in Notion credits
• $5,000 in MongoDB credits
• Up to $100,000 in Datadog credits
• 30% off Slack for the first year
• 6 months free of Zendesk Suite and Zendesk Sales CRM
• Up to $120,000 in Logz.io credits
• 50% off Pipedrive for 1 year
• $1,200 in Retool credits for 1 year
• $1,000 in Miro credits
• $10,000 in Freshworks credits
• Up to 90% off Dropbox DocSend
• Up to 50% off annual HelloSign Essentials
• 40% off annual subscription of specific Dropbox plans
• 20% off Apollo.io plans
• Free Intercom for 1 year, 50% off 2nd year, 20% off forever
• $10,000 in Mux credits
• 20% off annual contracts of Front for 1 year
• …and many more.

These perks could change over time at the discretion of AWS Activate and the respective companies behind them.

What email address should I use in the application?

Startups applying to AWS Activate need to use the same email address used to create their AWS account. If a startup does not yet have an AWS account, they can open one for free here.

My credits are nearing expiry. It is possible to get an extension on the credit expiration date?

We are unable to offer credit extensions. We encourage startups to only redeem an Activate Portfolio offer once they have confidence they’ll be able to utilize it within the expiration window.

What’s the application process for AWS Activate?

Nothing crazy really, it consists of a few steps that take about 7-10 working days once you apply. The high-level overview of the process include the following:

1. Fill up the first application. First, you apply using the application form on this page.
2. Your application is reviewed. Your application gets reviewed against the criteria set by AWS Activate.
3. Fill up the final application. Once approved, you get another email with additional instructions and a final application form to fill out.
4. Receive confirmation email. StartUp Bahrain receives an email to confirm your final application.
5. Receive credits. Startup receives a welcome email from Activate, and credits are applied to the startup’s account.

I’m having trouble understanding your credits system. Can you explain how it works?

Since AWS introduced Activate many years ago, they’ve learned that most startups benefit from larger credit rewards when they are further along in their journey, as early-stage startups that receive their first credits from the start are often not positioned to utilize the full award before their credits expire. Therefore, the Activate team assigns StartUp Bahrain with AWS credit amounts deemed most appropriate for the stage of startups they predominantly have.

This structure maximizes the time startups have to access free AWS resources and ensures they’re able to incrementally receive access to more credits as they grow until the $100K lifetime maximum is reached. For example, if a startup redeems $100K in AWS credits but only utilizes $15K by the one-year expiration deadline, the startup is not eligible for additional Activate Portfolio offers.

How can startups get access to additional credits after they’ve redeemed an AWS Activate Portfolio offer?

Startups are able to apply for more than one Activate Portfolio offer as long as they do not have an existing application still processing. To apply for Activate Portfolio again, startups must 1) be associated with StartUp Bahrain, 2) have not yet reached the $100K credit lifetime maximum, and 3) still meet the eligibility requirements of the program.

If startups are unsure of how many credits they have received in the past, they can check their credit history in the Activate Console.