How AWS Empowers Intercom to Thrive as a Product-First Company

I was fortunate enough to be invited to attend the AWS re:invent conference in Law Vegas this week (3/6 December). An immersive experience and where I got to interview fellow Irish man, Brian Scanlan, principle engineer at Intercom - I know that’s a long way to interview someone from home, but sometimes the best conversations happen when fellow countryfolk talk far from home. Here is our conversation exclusive for Hackernoon.

In today’s tech-driven landscape, customer experience is a vital differentiator for businesses. Intercom, a leading customer service software provider, has embraced a "product-first" philosophy that prioritizes creating seamless, user-friendly solutions for its clients. At the heart of this mission lies its robust partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS), a collaboration that enables Intercom to innovate, scale, and deliver consistent value.

Brian Scanlon, Principal Systems Engineer at Intercom, shared insights into how AWS supports the company’s ambitions. His perspective reveals a compelling narrative of efficiency, collaboration, and technical excellence.

A Culture of Focus

“Intercom is a product-first company,” Scanlon explains. “Our founders are product people—designers—and our focus has always been on building tools that customers enjoy using. This focus influences everything we do, from how we structure work to the way we reward teams.”

This commitment to prioritizing product development over flashy engineering has shaped the company's technological approach. Instead of chasing the latest trends, Intercom adopts a technically conservative strategy, using proven tools and methods to deliver a consistent, high-quality experience.

Scanlon elaborates, “We’re not an engineering-first company. While we value innovation, our approach is deliberate. We avoid reinventing the wheel unless it’s essential for the product or business.”

Why AWS?

AWS is an integral part of this strategy. When Intercom began its journey, the decision to build on AWS was a natural choice. The platform’s scalability, breadth of services, and cost-efficiency aligned well with Intercom’s needs.

“AWS has been with us from the start,” Scanlon says. “Their platform provides the reliability and scalability we need to serve our customers effectively. With their dynamic scaling capabilities, we can operate at the scale of our largest clients without needing to maintain idle capacity.”

Intercom’s use of AWS spans multiple layers of its infrastructure. From leveraging AWS’s Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances to power its backend services to utilizing Amazon Bedrock for building advanced AI-driven features, the partnership underpins both stability and innovation.

Optimizing for Cost and Performance

Intercom’s commitment to cost efficiency is a recurring theme in its operations, and AWS plays a critical role here as well.

“We’ve become very good at capacity planning and optimizing our architecture for cost,” Scanlon notes. “AWS’s ability to dynamically scale resources ensures we’re not paying for unused capacity. Additionally, their extensive range of features allows us to fine-tune our operations to achieve both cost savings and reliability.”

This optimization is a collaborative effort. “Our cost management team works closely with AWS account teams to ensure we’re leveraging the platform to its full potential,” he adds. “This year, we’ve seen significant gains by having a fully dedicated AWS account team advocating for us, opening doors, and escalating critical issues.”

Enabling Innovation

While Intercom’s technical strategy is conservative in some areas, it doesn’t shy away from innovation where it matters most. The company’s recent advancements in AI-powered customer support tools, such as the Fin chatbot, are a testament to this.

“Our investment in AI is an area where we push the boundaries,” Scanlon explains. “For instance, the Fin chatbot leverages AWS Bedrock, enabling us to offer cutting-edge AI-driven experiences. This innovation keeps us at the forefront of the market while maintaining our product-first ethos.”

The partnership with AWS also fosters a collaborative environment for innovation. By engaging with AWS’s product and service teams, Intercom gains insights into emerging technologies and best practices.

A Reflection of Culture

Ultimately, the relationship between Intercom and AWS is more than a technical alignment; it’s a cultural fit. Both organizations share a focus on delivering value through reliability and innovation.

“We’ve built a culture at Intercom that’s focused on what matters: the product,” Scanlon says. “AWS complements this by providing the tools and services we need to succeed. Their platform allows us to focus on what we do best while knowing we have a reliable foundation to support us.”

This synergy extends beyond the technical realm. “Having a strong relationship with our AWS account team has been a game-changer,” Scanlon adds. “They anticipate our needs, help us navigate challenges, and ensure we’re maximizing the value of their platform.”

The Future

As Intercom continues to grow and innovate, its partnership with AWS will remain a cornerstone of its strategy. The combination of a product-first philosophy and a scalable, reliable infrastructure positions Intercom to navigate the evolving demands of customer service software confidently.

Scanlon reflects, “AWS allows us to stay true to our mission. By handling the heavy lifting of infrastructure, they let us focus on what matters most: building products that customers love.”

This focus on partnership and alignment is what enables Intercom to not only thrive but also redefine what it means to deliver exceptional customer service in the digital age.