University of Manchester accelerates cloud access for researchers with RONIN on AWS

The University of Manchester is one of the UK’s leading research-intensive universities, supporting work across medical, engineering, and scientific disciplines. Its Research IT team helps researchers and teaching teams use advanced computing resources for projects, experimentation, and learning.

As demand for cloud computing grew, the university needed a faster way to support researchers without increasing manual work for IT. Many projects required bespoke environments, but setting these up manually was time consuming. In some cases, researchers had to wait weeks before they could begin work.

The challenge was not only speed. Researchers often work within fixed grant allocations, making cost visibility essential as projects progress. The university also needed cloud access to operate within clear security guardrails, so researchers could move quickly while Research IT maintained oversight and governance.

“The last thing we want is for IT to become a bottleneck,” says Robert Haines, director of Research IT at The University of Manchester. “Researchers need to move at the pace of their ideas.”

To give researchers and course teams faster access to cloud resources without increasing manual work for IT, the University of Manchester looked at self-service platforms already being used by other research-intensive universities. RONIN, an AWS Partner, had come up in conversations with peer institutions, and the university explored the platform further after seeing a live demonstration at the Supercomputing conference in Atlanta.

The university adopted RONIN on AWS through AWS Marketplace, creating a managed research computing platform within its AWS environment. The approach reduced the need to treat each request as a separate IT project, while giving researchers a more direct way to launch approved cloud environments.

RONIN deployed and managed the platform, including updates and security controls, while AWS provided proof-of-concept (PoC) credits during the initial phase. This gave the university a funded environment to test use cases, build internal confidence, and validate the platform against its security and operating requirements before expanding access.

The platform runs on core AWS services, including Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) for researcher workloads, Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) for data storage, Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon EBS), and Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS). RONIN sits on top of these services to provide pre-approved templates, images, and cost controls that align with the university’s security and governance requirements.

Before broadening access, the university validated RONIN against its security and data protection requirements. RONIN also delivered training for internal IT teams and the first cohort of academic users before launch, so the service went live with technical controls and user readiness in place. “We were able to get this in quickly, with high security controls and training in place—and we didn’t compromise on anything,” says Rhiannon Sutton, scrum master at The University of Manchester.

Budget visibility became part of the operating model from the start. Dashboards integrated with AWS cost data give each researcher visibility into grant spend in near real time, while automated thresholds alert administrators when spending approaches defined limits. The approach also extends to teaching, where course teams manage student allocations through the platform.

The University of Manchester can now set up researchers and course teams with governed cloud resources in one day, down from processes that previously took weeks and, in some cases, up to five weeks. Research groups can begin work sooner, while IT teams use a repeatable model instead of creating a bespoke environment for each request.

That faster model has supported broader adoption across the university. More than 60 researchers actively use RONIN, and two courses now run on the platform. For teaching teams, RONIN makes cloud computing a practical part of coursework, giving students hands-on experience with tools they can use beyond the classroom.

According to Dr. Peter Freeman, Lecturer in Healthcare Sciences (Clinical Bioinformatics) at The University of Manchester, RONIN has changed how teaching teams deliver cloud-based coursework. “RONIN has provided us with a flexible and scalable solution for teaching software engineering, systems administration, and diagnostic sequencing capabilities we were previously unable to deliver. The system’s flexibility allows us to quickly meet students’ needs by scaling machines up or down without relying on a central IT team. It has been well received by students and has truly transformed our approach.”

The platform has also changed how researchers manage grant-funded cloud spending. With real-time budget visibility and automated spend thresholds, research teams can monitor spending against fixed allocations and make provisioning decisions during active projects. This gives researchers more confidence to use cloud resources while maintaining clearer control over research budgets.

For the university’s Research IT team, the shift to controlled self-service has reduced manual provisioning effort, allowing the team to expand access for new research, teaching, and AWS proof-of-concept work. Research teams can use RONIN to test ideas before applying for funding.

“With RONIN on AWS, we’ve solved cloud access for our researchers. They can now get started without waiting weeks for IT to set up each environment, freeing our team to focus on what’s next,” says Haines.