 Live from the Oracle Conference Center in the heart of Silicon Valley, extracting the signal from the noise, it's theCUBE covering the Oracle Cloud Launch. Brought to you by Oracle. Now your host, John Furrier and Dave Vellante. Okay, welcome back everyone. We are live in Redwood Shores, California here at the Oracle headquarters. Behind us is an empty studio stadium of conference members. We're at Larry Ellison will appear and give the keynote speech. This is theCUBE pre-gaming Larry Ellison and all the executives. Cloud Platform, Oracle Cloud Platform Launch coming up here at one o'clock with Larry Ellison on stage. I'm John Furrier, the founder of SiliconANGLE theCUBE with Dave Vellante, my co-founder of theCUBE as well. And our next guest is Mike Cuban with PharmaVite, director of Enterprise Solutions. Welcome to theCUBE. Thank you. Glad to be here. So we're about to kick off and we're kind of pre-gaming and kind of going in. We actually have the announcement release in front of us. We can't really say it yet but it's going to be unveiled with Larry Ellison but really it's about the cloud. Cloud is an integrated solution and having the ability to be on-premise in the cloud really kind of the meat and potatoes of what enterprises are doing right now. So not so much a forward-thinking vision as it is tactical execution. What are some of the things that's going on in your world relative to PharmaVite around leveraging the cloud? What's on your radar? What's your environment look like? Share with us what's happening with you guys. Yeah. So I think first of all, we're fairly new to the cloud from PharmaVite. We have a fairly significant Oracle footprint, on-premise footprint. And certainly the cloud is something that we've been talking about and looking at for quite some time. I think some of the concerns that we have are shared by all. How do we truly get an integrated platform across the entire environment? So I think we're beginning to just step into this arena. So we recently made a couple cloud purchases. So we bought the Oracle Process Cloud Service to work with. We also bought at the same time our business process management. So the on-premise business process management, along with the process cloud. So we have some objectives there. We also bought in the application world. We bought the innovation product in the cloud as well. So that's something. What's the pitch there from Oracle? Just seamless execution across environments? Say that again? What's the pitch from Oracle on that solution? Seamless execution across cloud and on-prem? I think the long-term sale is that seamless execution. I think key driver is the ability to deliver applications faster, quicker, for us to be able to answer the business needs in a much faster environment, rather than rolling out a bunch of different applications. We have, currently, we have an initiative that is focused around upgrading our core systems, but more so focused around business process transformation. So we have a word that we use. We call it vanillazation. So we want to take the on-premise initiatives, and we want to get rid of that customization that, unfortunately, we put into play a decade ago. That was innovation at two decades ago. It was, right, exactly. Now you're going for maximum vanilla. Yeah, maximum vanilla. That's where we're at. And I think our hope there is not only can we make the business work better, but I think that will prepare us from a cloud perspective going forward. So what are the drivers in your business that are pushing you toward that homogeneity? You're a dietary supplement company, health products and food, and everybody talks about transformation. Describe the drivers in your business, the tensions in your business, and why homogeneity is so important. Yeah, so I think, within the supplement business, there's been a lot of new entries into the party, per se. And so we have been a leader in certainly in the US and the global market in providing those supplements. We have a very inner drive for quality products, right? And we've got to develop those quality, deliver those quality products in a timely manner. I think one of the key things that we see now is a drive for greater innovation, right? So we've seen a lot of things come into play in the vitamin world, right? So we've seen gummies come into play now, taken by storm. We've seen probiotics as a key aspect for us now. And I think for us, there's a couple of different facets. One is the ability to innovate, innovate faster, get to market faster, get to delivery. There's also the operational, right? So we're primarily a manufacturer. That's what we do. We manufacture vitamins, we manufacture billions of vitamins, right? And our ability to do that, right, in a much faster process, right, holistically across the enterprise, I think is where we're after. So sometimes I think we get so busy that the, unfortunately silos begin to develop within the functions and we don't talk to one another as well as we would like. I think, so that really has, is our drive for business process transformation around the process aspect. We think there's a lot of room for us to improve. We think there's a lot of areas for us to develop new process, develop them faster, develop them better, ultimately get cheaper, right? So, you know, we have, you know, faster, better, cheaper. It's an old mantra. We all use it, but we think we can get there and we think the cloud will help us do that better. I want to get your take on something you just said, because earlier you said, you know, years ago innovation was the complex and the customization. And you're talking about basically business value, same competitive advantage, ship stuff faster, be more efficient. The old IT was consolidate, reduce costs, kind of get that operational efficiency down. Now the business drivers are driving it. How much does that has changed in the past few years? Is there a point in time you can say, well, it started kicking in with the cloud. What is the key transformation around the business value conversation? And how much of the conversations that you're in is business value versus reduced costs and make things, the lights, you know, more efficient? Yeah, we've, I think we've been really lucky with our business partners across the environment all the way through the executive team. I think they understand, even though they may not get all the detail that goes on, you know, in technology, they understand the value of that technology and what we can bring to the table. You know, myself and in fact my boss, we joined just a little over five years ago with Formabite and, you know, the environment that kind of existed at that time, we call it, they were order takers, right? So we had a desire early on to move from what we call order taker to business enabler, right? So that we can take, you know, contextual type IT services and move them down to a different layer where we can execute them with almost without thinking, so that we can take our staff, our IT expertise, and I think IT brings something to the table that is also under, it's too often undervalued and that is a knowledge of the enterprise view, right? So we have to understand how every process works and how you automate it, how you work with it, you know, as an old cobalt programmer, you used to do that stuff, right? And then it somehow became all about technology. Well, we don't want it to be about technology, right? Even though technology is a solution. We want it to be about the business process, enabling that business process to understand how they work, understand how they define and improve and manage those business processes. It's interesting, you mentioned touching all the different points of the organization in these quote, data-driven enterprises, which is kind of a buzzword these days. IT has all the data. Yeah. I mean, when you get a new employee and you know how to onboard them, but also do you give them the phone and user experience, so now the developer piece of the data is interesting. Do you see that connecting into your piece too and how you build the organization? Yeah, absolutely. So one of the key items that we have we have a pretty solid roadmap for IT going forward. One of those items is what we call Enterprise Information Management, right? It's not new, it's not creative, but it does tie into, you know, not just, so the problem with data is you can have lots of data, right? But if it's not driving any value, if you're not getting the information out of it, if you're not getting the analytics out of it, it's just data, right? So, you know, I think about process orientation, right? So when we go into projects, you know, there's a lot of great intent to make process improvement, you know, and they all become little diagrams that end up on the shelf, or they end up as a file with 10,000 other files and never get used again. And I think, you know, we want to see the usage of process and data, right, across the organization. We have a desire, so one of the areas I'm responsible for is enabling technology and it's the idea of being able to do the business to do their job whenever they need to, wherever they are on whatever device, right? And, you know, the only way we can do that is to get transparent across the architecture and provide that information. We deal a lot with market data, you know, it drives decisions and where we are and how many points did we jump, right? And unfortunately, too often, that's sitting in spreadsheets, right? And it's sitting in a myriad of spots that nobody can consolidate and we can't... Visualize it. Visualize it, right? Exactly, right? And it's a lot of work. I mean, you know, for how many decades have we been talking about data warehouses and business intelligence and, you know, to see the real value come to fruition I think has been very difficult for us. I still believe it's possible. I believe, you know, the cloud and that ultimate integration of applications and services across the various platforms can help us get there. So why? I mean, IT has always had a visibility in the entire business. Like I said, like it all became about the technology. We sort of forgot about that. What is it about the cloud? Is it that it just allows you to do things faster or less heavy lifting that you can focus more on the process integration? Yeah, I... Describe that a bit. Well, at least I think that's our hope, right? That it will reduce, you know, the run side of the organization. You know, we use the term KTLO, keep the lights on, right? That's the stuff that, unfortunately, has been taking up IT's time, right? You know, we're too busy trying to keep the systems running and maintaining them that we don't stop and figure out how to better utilize the information that's there, right? So I think too often, IT is the one that's trying to, you know, you know, go to the business and go, look, here, I've got all this data, right? But it doesn't mean anything to them, right? Because we're not tying IT and business together to really rationalize and make sense of what that information actually means. And that KTLO is what, 80% of your effort? Yeah, it's a little, you know, we've done a pretty good job on that. So we've moved the needle, right? So I think we generally sit between the 50 to 60% realm. Where do you want to get with cloud? I mean, is that pretty good? I'd like to get a lot lower than that. So I mean, literally, I'd like to get down to a 20 to 30% realm, right? And that might not be just internal, but it might also be using partners, right? So, you know, one of the things that the cloud brings to bear, I think, is the opportunity, sorry, to get others to do that mundane, contextual type activities, right? So the KTLO, keeping the lights on, begs the question of SWTPI, which is skating to where the puck is. I love it. Which is what you're saying. Absolutely. How do you get out front to skating to where the puck is going to be in IT? That's a moving train, if you will. Kind of it's always shifting. How do you guys do that? I mean, take us to the mindset of you want to be right on the puck, right on your stick. That's cloud. That's big data. You mentioned some of the data analytics piece. What's that all about? Yeah, so I grew up in Wisconsin. I love hockey, but I was never very good at it. But I think, you know, that's the challenge. I think first and foremost, you've got to have that relationship with the business, right? So, you know, where you have a seat at the table, you have a seat at the executive table, and at Farmer Bite, we have that, and I think that brings good value. So the second is then forming the relationships on down through the chain, right? So that we are working, you know, in tandem, developing, you know, the necessary activities. I think also, you know, IT is no longer the answer for all the technology solutions. I mean, I think it's very clear that, you know, that the business partnership has a lot more acknowledgement of technology than certainly than they did 20, 30 years ago, right? They, in fact, can go get it. They don't need us, right? So how do we drive value, right, to the business? I think we do that by understanding the business, right? So, I mean, you can go out and get a lower cost provider, right? Who might be able to do some things cheaper. You can go out and get an app that might solve a tactical, you know, issue, but it doesn't answer the ultimate strategy of enterprise integration. And I think, you know, that's what we bring to the table. So I know it's early days for you guys, but so where are you starting with the Oracle Process Cloud? What processes are you really focusing on? Yeah, so we are moving forward basically with a hybrid approach, right? So we purchased the Oracle Process Cloud service along with the business process management, right? So within, as I said, one of our major programs, we're basically starting from the ground up. So the first thing that we're trying to do is to gather, you know, all these myriad of documents that have been created over the years and begin to centralize a spot where we can at least acknowledge the information that we have to date. Then we begin to manage that within the business programs, right? And ultimately, we get to a spot where we actually integrate those process activities with the applications, but not just with the applications, but also the portions in between that aren't enabled, right? So if you talk about our ERP, talking to Demontra or talking to ASCP or talking to PLM or any one of those applications, it's about, you know, making sure that the process is integrated across all those aspects. And the planning involved has to be tight. Oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah. And so making sure all those gaps are filled and then you're always going to have other processes that are a little bit manual in nature, right? And sometimes if those are left aside, they kind of take hold, and that's where you end up with lots of different spreadsheets. We think with the Oracle Process Cloud Service that we can automate those eventually, right? That can drive the value to the business to really manage day-to-day work, right, across the organization. You know, again, we're very new in this so we're starting at the ground up, right? But that vision is to fully automate and integrate work activities across the organization, which can then drive KPIs and service metrics that we can actually evaluate how the processes are working. What's your advice, final question and the segment is, what's your advice to folks out there who are really putting their arms around this now, down in direction, planning is obviously key, but to operationalize the cloud is not that trivial. Sounds easy. You're just bringing up some obvious points. IT is all the data. Data's key. Process is key. Data's key in the process. How do you advise folks, friends, and say, hey, you know, Mike, how do I operationalize this cloud stuff? Well, you know, since we're just getting into it, I'm not sure we actually have the answers right to that. I think, you know, I think we've taken a very slow approach, slow and steady approach to making sure that this is going to work for us. So certainly on the infrastructure side, we've basically created a private cloud, right? We think that will put us in a position to move that to the next stage. Within the application suite, right? We've pretty much remained on-premise, right? But now we've got the opportunity with the innovation to take one step, right? From my perspective, it's, you know, making sure that the plan is there, that the roadmap's in play, but to take a steady but methodical approach, right, to carving up the area. I think for us, you know, the logical focus down to the process management really made sense because we think that enables the entire business across our world anyways. Mike, thanks so much for the insight here on theCUBE. We are live here at Redwood Shores for the special Oracle Cloud Platform announcements here where Larry Ellsby delivered the keynote among other executives here at Oracle. This is theCUBE. We'll be right back with more pre-gaming of the event coverage after this short break.