 From around the globe, it's theCUBE. Covering HPE Discover Virtual Experience brought to you by HPE. Welcome to theCUBE's coverage of HPE Discover 2020, the virtual experience. I'm Lisa Martin and I'm pleased to be joined by two guests from HPE Long Time Partner, Tech Data. We have Colin Blair, the Vice President of Sales and Marketing of IoT and Data Solutions and David Smith, HPE Pre-Sales Field Solutions Architect. Colin and David, welcome to theCUBE. Thanks, Lisa. Glad to be here. Great to see you guys. So let's start with Colin HPE and Tech Data have been partners for over 40 years, but tell our audience a little bit about tech data before we get into the specifics of what you're doing and some of the cool IoT stuff with HPE. Thanks, Lisa. So Tech Data is a Fortune 100 distributor. We've continued to evolve to be a solutions aggregator in these next generation technology businesses. So as you've mentioned, we've been serving the IT distribution markets globally for 40 plus years. And we're now moving into next generation technologies like cloud analytics, IoT and security, global life cycle management services to be able to position ourselves with our customer base and the needs that their clients have. So I'm excited to be here today and talk a little bit about what we're doing in IoT and analytics with David on the HPE side. And in addition to the 40 plus years of partnership calling that you mentioned that Tech Data and HPE have, you've got over 200 plus HPE resources. David, you're one of those guys in the field. Talk to us about some of the things that you're working on with channel partners, David, to enable them especially during such crazy times that we're living in now. Absolutely, absolutely. So what we can do is we can provide strong sales on technical enablement. If your team, for example, wants to better understand how to position the HPE portfolio if they require assistance in architecting a secure performance IoT solution, we can help ensure that your technical team is fully capable of having that conversation. And it's one that they're able to have with confidence. We can validate the proposed HPE solutions with the customer's technical requirements and proposed use case. We can even assist on a customer calls if it would benefit our partner. To kind of extend out to that, we also have a deep technical bench that Colin can speak to in the IoT space to lean on as well for solutions that kind of span into the space beyond where HPE typically operates, which would be edge computing and network security. Excellent. Colin, tell me a little bit about Tech Data's investments in IoT. When did this start? What are you guys doing today? Sure, we started in the cloud space first to tackle this opportunity in data center modernization and hybrid cloud. That was about seven years ago. Shortly thereafter, we started investing very materially in the cybersecurity space. And then we followed that with data analytics and then the internet of things. Now we've been in those spaces with our long-term partners for some time, but now that we're seeing this movement to the intelligent edge and a real focus on business outcomes and specialization, we've kind of tracked with the market and we feel like we've been best a little bit ahead of where the channel is in terms of supporting our ecosystem of partners in this space. So the intelligent edge has been growing for quite some time. Colin, in the very unique times that we're living in in 2020, how are you seeing that intelligent edge expand even more? And what are some of the pressing opportunities that Tech Data and HPE's IoT solutions together can address? So a couple. So the first is, as I mentioned earlier, just data center modernization. And so in the middle of COVID-19 and perhaps post COVID-19, we're going to see a lot of clients that are gonna be focused on monetizing the things that they've got, but doing so to drive business outcomes. We believe that increasingly the predominance of use cases and compute and analytics is going to move to the edge. And HPE's got a great portfolio for not just on-premise, high-performance computing, but also hybrid cloud computing. And then when we get into the edge with Edgeline and networking with Aruba and devices that need to be digitized and sensorized, it's a really great partnership. And then what we're able to do also, Lisa, is we've been investing in vertical market since 2007. And I've been along the ride with that team most all of that way. So we've got deep specialization in healthcare and industrial manufacturing, retail, and then public sector. And then the last thing that we've kind of turned on here recently, just last month, is a strategic partnership in the Smarter Cities space. So we're able to leverage a lot of those vertical market capabilities, couple that with our HPE organization and really drive specialized, repeatable solutions in these vertical markets where we believe increasingly, customers are going to be more interested in repeatable solutions that can drive quick proof of value, proof of concepts with minimal viable kinds of products. And that's kind of where we're partnering today with our HPE organization and the HPE corporation. So, David, let's double click into some of those of vertical markets that Colin mentioned. Some of the things that pop into minor healthcare, manufacturing, as we know, supply chains have been very challenging COVID. Give us an insight into what you're hearing from channel partners now virtually. But what are some of the things that are oppressing importance in 2020? So from oppressing importance to Colin's exact point and to your exact point as well, is really it's all about the edge computing space. Now, from a product perspective, as Colin had mentioned earlier, HPE has their edge line converged systems, which has kind of taken the functionality of OT and IT and combined it into a single edge processing compute solution. You kind of couple that with the ability to configure components such as Tesla GPUs and specific edge line offerings to offer an aid in things like real time video processing and analytics. And a perfect example of this is a social distancing in the COVID space. If I need to be able to analyze a group of people to ensure they're staying as far apart as possible or within social distancing guidelines, that is where kind of the real time edge line compute aspect of things can be taken advantage of. Same things with the leveraging cameras where you can actually take temperature detection as well. So it's really kind of best to think of edge lines solutions as data center computing at the edge to kind of transition into the Aruba space. Aruba also has offerings aid in the IoT security, such as ClearPass device insight, which allows for device discovery of network and monitoring of wired and wireless devices. There's also Aruba asset tracking and real time location of solutions. And that's particularly important in the healthcare space as well. If I have a lot of high value assets, things like wheelchairs, things like ventilation devices, where are these things located within my facilities and how can I keep track of them? They also, and by they, I mean HP, they also kind of leverage an expansive ecosystem of partners. As an example, they leverage thing works a lot of their IoT solutions as well. When you kind of tie that all together with HP point next, the end customer is provided with the comprehensive IoT solution. So Colin, how ready are channel partners and the end user customers to rapidly pivot and start either deploying more technologies at the edge to be able to deliver some of the capabilities that David talked about in terms of analytics and sensors for social distancing? How ready are the channel partners and customers to be able to understand, adopt and execute this technology? So I think that on the understanding side, I think the partners are there. We've been talking about digital transformation in the channel for a couple of years now. And I think what's happened through the COVID-19 pandemic is that it's put a real spotlight on the need for those business outcomes to solve for very specific problems. And that's one of the values that we serve in the channel. So we've got a solution offering that we call our solution factory. And what we do, Lisa, is we leverage a process to look outside the industry at Gartner Magic Quadrant Solutions, Forrester Wave, G2 Crowd, top leaders, visionaries and understand what are those solutions that are in demand in these vertical markets that we talked about? And then we do a lot of work with David and his team internally in the HPE organization to be able to vet and then build out that reference architecture so that we know that there's a solution that drives a bill of materials and a reference architecture that's going to work, that clients are going to need, and we can do it quickly. Tech data, everything's about being bold, acting now, getting scale, and we've got a large ecosystem of partners that already have great relationships. So we pride ourselves in being able to identify what are those solutions that we can take to our partners that they can quickly take to their end users where we've kind of developed out what we think the 70 or 80% of that solution is going to look like, and then we drive point next and other services capabilities to be able to complete that last mile, if you will, on some of the customization. So we're helping them, for those who aren't ready, we're helping them. For those who already have very specific use cases and a practice that they drive with repeatable solutions, we're coming alongside them and understanding what can we do using our practice builder approach, which is our consultative approach to understand where our partners are going in the market, who their clients are, what skill sets do they have? What supplier affinities do they want to drive? What brand marketing or demand generation support do they need? And that's where we kind of take some of these solutions, bring them to bear and engage in that consultative engagement to accelerate being ready, as you rightly say. So TechData has a lot of partners in general. You also have a lot of partners in the IoT space. Colin, how do you, from a marketing hat perspective, how do you describe the differentiation that TechData and HPE's IoT solutions delivered to the channel to the end user? A couple of different things, I think that's differentiation. And that's one of the things that we strive for in the channel is to be specialized and to be competitively differentiated. And so the first part I say to all of my team, Lisa, is whether it's our solution consultants or our technical consultants or our solutions developers or the software development team that works in my organization, our goal is to be specialized in such a way that we're having relevant value-added conversations, not only our channel partners, but also end users of our partners want to bring us into those conversations and many do. The next is really education and enablement as you would expect. And so there's a lot of things that are specialized and are technical, where we drive education, certification programs, roadshows, seminars. One of the things that we're seeing a lot of interest now, Lisa, is for digital marketing. And we're driving some really neat offerings around digital marketing platforms that not only educate our partners, but also allow our partners to bring their end users and tour some of these technologies. So whether it's at our Clearwater office, where we've got an IoT solution center that we take our partners and their clients through, or we're using our facilities to do executive briefings and ideation as a service and kind of understanding the art of the possible with both our resellers and their clients, or if we're using our solution catalog. So we've built an interactive PDF that allows our partners to understand over 50 solutions that we've got and then be able to identify where would they like to bring in David and his team and then my consultants to do that deep planning and business development that we talked about a little bit earlier. So the engagement right now is maybe even more important than it has been in a while because it's all hands off and virtual. David talked to me about some of the engagement and the enablement piece that Colin talked about. How are you able to really keep a channel partner and use your customers engaged and interested in what you're able to deliver through this new virtual world? That's a great, great question. And we work in conjunction with our marketing teams to make sure that as new technologies and quite in the IoT space or as well as within the HPE space as well that our channel partners are educated and aware that these solutions exist. I know for a fact that for the majority of them you kind of get this consistent bombardment of new technology but being able to actually have someone go out and explain it and then being able to correspondingly position its use case and its functionality and why it would provide value for your end customer is one of the benefits that tech data adds to kind of build upon that previous statement. The fact that we have such a huge portfolio of partners. So you kind of have HPE in the edge compute space but we have so many different partners in the IoT space where it's really just a phone call and email a Skype message away to have that conversation around interoperability and then provide those quick responses back to our partners. Excellent. One more question before we go Colin for you. A lot of partners, why HPE for IoT? So a couple of reasons. One of the biggest reasons is HPE is just a great partner. And so when you look at evaluating IoT solutions that tend to be pretty comprehensive. In many cases, Lisa, it takes 10 or 12 partners to complete a real IoT solution and address a use case that's in the field. And so when you have a partner like HPE who's investing in these programs, investing in demand generation, investing in the spectrum of technology whether it's hybrid cloud, data center, compute, storage or edge devices and IoT gateways then to be able to contextualize those into what we call market ready solutions in each one of these vertical markets where there's references and there's use cases and we're coupling education that's specific around most solutions. HPE can do all of those things. And that's very important because in this new world, no one can go it alone anymore. It takes partnerships and we're all better together and HPE really does embrace that philosophy and they've been a great partner for us in the IoT space. Excellent. Well, Colin and David, thank you so much for joining me today on theCUBE. Tech Data HPE, IoT better together. Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure talking with you. Thank you, Lisa. Thank you, Lisa. And for Colin and David, I'm Lisa Martin. You're watching theCUBE's virtual coverage of HPE Discover 2020. Thanks for watching.