 Live from Nashville, Tennessee, it's theCUBE. Covering Commvault Go 2018, brought to you by Commvault. Welcome back to Nashville, Tennessee. You're watching theCUBE at Commvault Go. I'm Stu Miniman with my co-host Keith Townsend. Happy to welcome to the program, Lance Shaw, who's the Director of Solutions Marketing at Commvault. Thanks so much for joining us. Thank you so much, glad to be here. All right, so we've been having a great day here. We're talking to some of your partners, we're talking to some of your customers. Solutions Marketing, of course, everything's a solution these days. That's what we're looking for. Tell us a little bit about your background and what you do at Commvault. Absolutely, right? So I came from a product management and product marketing background. And one of the things that we're really focused on here at this show, of course, is all about, is customers and what their stories are. And frankly, how we can improve our products and our solutions to better meet the needs of the customers, right? That's ultimately what it all comes down to. And so, you know, that's why we're here. That's the whole reason for the show. I think what's been interesting so far at this show has been the focus on not only just cloud utilization, but the fact that customers are having to deal with multiple clouds. And the fact that, and why they have to do that. And there's a variety of reasons that drive people to say, well, you know, maybe five years ago, you would have said, are you using the cloud? Yeah, I've got one cloud provider, but now I've got lots. Yeah, and Lance, I'd love to hear what you're hearing from customers. Because one of the things you talk to the customers and they're like, oh, they have a multi-cloud strategy. And when you dig in, first of all, every customer has a totally different environment. And it reminds me, I spent the last like two decades trying to help customers get out of their silos. And in some ways I'm a little worried that we've just created a whole bunch of new silos that just don't happen to live in my data center and we called it multi-cloud. Because the strategy is, oh, well, I did this application for here and then, oh, there's this service over here that I needed and then I satisfied a bunch of stuff. So tell me we've got it all figured out. Customers, they have a good strategy. They're really sharp as to where they're going and the future is bright. Absolutely. Now the reality of that is that in fact, you're absolutely right. Unwittingly or unknowingly, we've gone back to a path of history repeating itself where I'm creating new silos of information and data. So you're absolutely right. Organizations start out with a point solution for a particular application or a particular data set or they acquired a company and so they brought in this new thing and pretty soon, I have no idea what I've got in the Singapore office versus the London office versus New York, right? So, and how do I reconcile that and bring it back together? So I've got that same old problem that if you've been around in the industry for a few years, we saw, you know, 10 years ago, 15 years ago, I've got to bring my silos of information together. And so, yeah, you're right. It's suddenly a new, the same old challenge all over again, right? So, and that's why it's become a focus area because I suddenly have fragmented, you know, disconnected application and data silos. So that's really where Commvault turns out can really help because sometimes it's a matter of consolidation. You know what, I need to get down from three locations to two or four to one or whatever the case may be, some sort of consolidation. And usually there's some sort of cost savings involved there or it's, you know, I've got these multiple solutions that are out there and I've got no control and I have no visibility and I know I'm exposed. So I've got a risk factor now that I didn't have before. So when you start to blend all those together, you're absolutely right. It's the same old story again, right? So industry versus vertical versus use case, you've given us a couple of different use cases, reducing costs, consolidation, even multi-clouding itself is a use case. But if you're an enterprise software company, if you're an enterprise IT company, you're challenged as you talk to different industries about specific solutions. You got to tailor solutions to industries. Talk about some of the industries that Commvault has come to solve specific problems for. Right, well I think, you know, there's a lot to be honest, right? Because every company faces those set of challenges. I think where it gets really interesting is in highly regulated industries, right? So you think about biopharmaceuticals, you think about financial services, and certainly in the government space, in the federal space. And they have a whole set of unique challenges there because you're dealing with top secret clouds and you're dealing with some special concerns there. I think where it gets of particular interest is when I've got all those fragmented or disconnected silos, is that I need to address my compliance concerns. I need to understand the data for more than just is it protected and could I recover it in a specific amount of time? I actually need to be able to show that I have it and prove that what I've got and be able to address specific industry regulations that are unique to my particular industry. So that's where we start to see very specific use cases that kind of get down from the generic or the general down to the very specific, how do I manage this data and how do I understand what I have? And then of course you get into, can you prove what you've got? Can you go out and retrieve it? And there's all sort of regulations along that that I've got to adhere to. But that can be addressed once I have that full index and understanding what my environment's like. Now I can go out and locate that information. I can retrieve it when I need to and actually open it up from a persona based access perspective, let specific people in an organization have access just to the limited data sets that they need. So that comes into play a lot, especially for example, every organization, you've got database admins, you've got critical Tier Zero applications that you need to manage, it's your CRM system, it's your supply chain management system. If it goes down, people freak out. And I want to be able to provide self-service access to information for those people. So I've got a well managed understanding of my environment, but then I'm able to dole out access to the individuals that need it when they need it. And they don't have to come ask us or ask IT or ask anybody else for that information. Yeah, Lance, as we watch the companies really understand that data is very valuable. We have a transition that's going on. Traditional customer for Commvault, you're talking about things like RPO and RTO and the like, and you've got the admins of the world trying to figure out how they do their jobs and things like, okay, backup windows of the past versus recovery and all those moving pieces. As opposed to today, you talk about the value of data. These are board level discussions. You've got the C-suite that you're working with. We've talked to a few of your teams about, well, you've got the top down and the bottom up. How are you helping them? What conversations do you have with them? They are entirely different conversations, right? IT is serving the business, as we all know, right? You know, maybe a bit cliche, sorry. Hopefully if they're doing their job right, they're responding to and actually doing their job. Why am I here? Oh, that's right, to serve the business. Let's try that. So anyway, there's that delivery of data, but you're absolutely right. The utilization of data and how it's consumed and the understanding that I can get from it, that is an entirely different conversation. And you're right, it is out of, there's a, well, it's a business unit discussion. It's a line of business discussion at the very least, and it's probably a senior executive discussion because with that additional visibility, I am then able to make much better, at least theoretically, better business decisions and because I've got more information to draw from. So you're right, in terms of the conversation, we're not talking about strictly data protection. It's like, yes, when your data is understood, here's what else you can do with it. And then you got to tailor that to the specific industry, specific vertical, more or more specific to that particular conversation. So Lance, give us a feel for that conversation that's happening here at Commvault Go. 2,000 people, over 150 sessions, education, focus event, and there's different personas. I like to focus on that executive persona a little bit. I got you in front of the SVP of some group, the CDO, what's the Commvault story? Why Commvault over any other data protection company? I like to think of it as the proverbial killing two birds with one stone, right? So is my data growing? Oh yeah, you're never going to hear someone say, you know data is shrinking, I have less to worry about. I mean, I've been in the industry a couple years now, give or take, and it's just never going to happen, right? And so you don't have to worry about, with that in mind, the need to be able to have visibility is continuing to increase. So you see the rise of a chief data officer and what are they concerned about? They're concerned about utilizing data in ways that they were previously never able to do. And so when we have those conversations, it's one of, if I'm going to kill two birds with one stone, I'm going to be able to not only protect my data, but I'm going to give you additional visibility that you didn't have before, because I'm providing you visibility into all of that secondary data and application protection, and I'm allowing you to be ultimately more flexible, because now you're able to actually move data where you need it. And expand your data center in ways that you previously could not. So I want to move from one cloud to the other, no problem, I can do that. I want to finally get off of tape and do, you know, consolidate my environments and move either to on-premises environment or to the cloud, not a problem. I can come back, we see customers that are coming back to on-premises from cloud in some cases, just for particular use cases. So the conversations that we have with a CDO, we'll just stick with the CDO as an example, are around better utilization of the data and better risk mitigation around that data, right? So I've had a number of conversations related to that where we're concerned about not, you know, everybody talks about ransomware, but in general attacks on the business, and it's not if it's when, so how do I make sure that I can keep my business up and running? And so it's that broader perspective that you have around how I manage data and how I deliver it to the business, that's what they care about, right? That's great that you protect it by the way, that's sort of important too. But what I can do with it and how I deliver it to my lines of business, that's where the interest starts to lie in a CDO level conversation. Yeah, Lance, one of the things everybody loves coming to a show like this, you get some of those great user stories. This morning we had the state of Colorado on talking about how they're recovering from ransomware. We had American Pacific Mortgage on talking about just the scale. You talk about the growing data and how, you know, using Commvault, they're able to manage that much better. Any other specific examples of kind of interesting use cases or good customer stories? Yeah, I think we recently had a very large customer that was looking to consolidate their environment. It's a classic case of, I've got offices spread around the world and they had a number of different point solutions, right? So it's a, you know, without naming names, I've got different protection solutions to different areas. I've got different administrators. I've got different policies and, you know, they hit a scenario where they were exposed from a risk perspective. That particular set of data was not covered as they thought it was because they didn't have standardization of policies or standardized policies, I should say, around how they manage access and the retention of that data. And so that, sometimes there's that forcing event that says, okay, we have a problem here. We need to do something about this, all right? So in their case, they were able to consolidate from multiple solutions down to Commvault where they could have a predefined set of policies in place around the data, not only for what they were gathering in. So as they ingested it or as they moved data under Commvault's management, you know, they were able to automatically assign policies to that. But then in their case, they were also acquiring other companies, right? So, and they were acquiring a rather large European entity and when they were bringing that organization in, they wanted to make sure that they did so in a way that didn't expose them to risk again in the future because they'd say, if we're going to grow as a business with an acquisition strategy, we've got to be able to make sure that what comes into the organization is consistent. So, big partner presence here. The Commvault has been pretty direct and forward talking about how you're shifting from a direct sales model and having going through partners to help provide the solutions to these challenges. Talk through, how do you enable partners or how do you encourage partners? This is a crowded market. There's a lot of investment in the area of data protection. How do you rise to the top of the partner list and for partners putting your solution in front of customers? Right, there's two ways we do that, right? So, because you're absolutely right, partners are key to our growth and we can be key to their growth and success. No doubt about it. So, the first thing is give them something that's going to really make them successful. So, instead of, if I'm a partner, I don't want to come in with, I want the flexibility to be able to address a wider variety of demands. I want to be able to go in to a potential prospect and say, yeah, I can address this, but also I have the software behind the scenes, Commvault, to be able to attack multiple other scenarios for you. Oh, and by the way, it's all in one and you've got one solution to be able to address all that. So, one of the key ways that we differentiate in your right, in a very crowded market, right? It says, you know, you should really have Commvault in the back of your mind at the top of your list. If you're going in and seeing scenarios where a point solution simply doesn't do it or it paints you into a corner where you're not going to be able to help them grow down in the future. Because the other thing partners obviously want as every business wants is repeat business. I want to be able to go back in and expand. I want to, you know, build my footprint out. And if I can go in with a partner that enables me to do that, then I've got long-term opportunity versus just going in, hey, I made a quick sale and I'm out and, you know, good luck to you, right? All right, last thing I want to ask you, last year GDPR was the, you know, the talk of every single show. Yeah, I seem to have heard about that, yeah. We got a good education. My boss actually read through the entire specs. I read the Cliff Notes version. Okay, yeah. And talked to a lot of smart people about it. California's looking at some new legislation, but what's the latest on that? It seems like, you know, I mean, some of the lawsuits already happened to get some of the biggest companies in Europe, you know, from a technology standpoint, but what are you hearing and how does CommVelt help customers understand kind of today and future legislation? Yeah, I think, you know, what's interesting, we, when we looked at, you know, everybody was kind of marching up to the GDPR date as if it was Y2K all over again, right? And not that I remember that, of course, since too young for that. But, you know, it was like, oh, May 25th, May 25th, the sky's going to fall. And we all knew that, hey, listen, that day's going to come and go. And, you know, somebody's going to be made an example of it at some point, right? And sure enough, that's starting to happen. And, you know, it's a good thing. It's building the awareness that, you know, we try to educate people, try to get the word out. You know, it happens longer than, way past May 25th, it's still going on, right? So, for a lot of customers that we're talking to, they're looking to, they've had a plan in place and they're moving there gradually. It wasn't, you know, right away, but I think sometimes when you see those things in the press about there's actually being a fine, it's actually real, and it brings it to life, like, ah, we should really do something here, right? So, I think, honestly, that's a process that's going to continue for years. You know, I've heard everything from, we'll just pay the fine, which, you know, is a risky strategy, both probably, you know, on a personal level, as well as professional, like, you wouldn't want to bet your career on that strategy, and, but you know, with the advent of, we also always knew that, hey, GDPR is one of these set of regulations, there will be others, there are others, and you have to be able to adhere to those no matter where you live on the earth. So, you know, long story short, I think, you know, it's a continuing evolution. We help customers understand their data. So, you know, through our Commvault Activate product, we can do it, even if you don't, even if you're not using Commvault for backup and recovery, you're actually able to go out and scan your environment and get a better understanding of what personal information you've got under Lock and Key, what you've got in your environment, and be able to ascertain, well, okay, now, where's my risk, where am I exposed, and then I can start to put a plan in place to mitigate that. So, I think it'll be going on for quite some time in terms of, especially as new laws, like the California law, I always forget what that's, I always forget the letters and numbers associated with it, but it's the same idea around personal privacy, and I think, you know, with, you know, we've had the Patriot Act for a long time, right, where foreign governments are concerned about data sovereignty and where data lives, and that's going to continue to increase for, you know, for a variety of reasons. So, organizations have to really know where their data is and what's encapsulated within that data, and that's where the Commvault data platform, and the index actually shines and does very well to uncover that information. All right, well, Lanshaw, I really appreciate you sharing with us where your customers are and a lot of these really important issues. For Keith Townsend, I'm Stu Miniman, and we'll be back with more coverage here from Commvault Go in Nashville, Tennessee. Thanks for watching theCUBE.