 Cloud Computing friends, and welcome back to theCUBE where we are live from Las Vegas, Nevada. Here at AWS ReInvent all week, my name is Savannah Peterson, very excited to be joined by Paul Gillan today. How are you doing? I'm doing great, Savannah, it's my first re-invent. I was just going to ask you if you've ever been re-invent. It's dazzling, much like the sequence. On your top, it's dazzling. Jam-packed affair. I came to the Comdex conference for many years in Las Vegas, which was a huge event, and this really rivals it in terms of the crowd sizes, but I think there's more intensity here, there's more excitement. People are just jazzed about being here, to the extent that I never saw at other computer conferences. I thought I would agree with you. It's my first re-invent as well. I'm about to share this experience together, and the vibe, the calls, I think being back in person is really contagious as well. Maybe the wrong word to use, but in a great way. Energy is definitely radiating between people here. I'll watch my words a little bit better. And in person, we have with us, Samuel Nichols, the director of Public Cloud at Global Product Marketing at VM Software. Sam, is it Sam or Samuel? Depends if I'm in trouble. Depends on who's saying it out loud. Yeah, yeah, it's typically Samuel is usually reserved for my mother, so. Well, Sam, thanks for joining us. We'll stick with Sam on the show. So VM, been a red-hot company for several years, really made its reputation in the VMware world. Now you've got this wholesale shift to the cloud. Not that VMware is not important still, but how is that affecting, you're shifting with it, how is that affecting your role as a product manager and the business overall? Yeah, it's a fantastic question. Obviously, Veeam was pioneered in terms of being the purpose-built backup and recovery company for VMware. And as these workloads are being transitioned from the data center into the cloud or just net new workloads being created in the cloud, there is that equal need for backup and recovery there. So it's incredibly important that we were able to provide a purpose-built backup and recovery solution for workloads that live in AWS as well. And how different is it backing up an AWS workload compared to a VMware workload? I think it depends on what kind of service a user is utilizing, right? There's infrastructure as a service, platform as a service, software as a service. And given that the differences in what is exposed to that customer, that can make backup and recovery quite challenging. So I would say that the primary thing that we want to look at is utilizing native snapshots as our first line of defense when it comes to backup and recovery, irrespective of what workload that might be, whether it's a virtual machine, Amazon EC2, some sort of database on Amazon RDS, FileShare, so on. I bet you're seeing a lot across verticals and across the industry, given the support that you're giving customers. What are you seeing in the market and in customer environments? What are some of those trends? So I think the major trends that we highlight in our data protection trend support, which is a new update is coming very shortly in the new year, is- Do we have to check that out? Yeah, absolutely. The physical server is on a decline within the data center. Via virtualized workloads, namely VMware, is relatively static, kind of flat. The real hockey stick is with the cloud-based workloads. And as I mentioned before, that is partially because workloads are being transitioned from physical virtual machines to being cloud-hosted. But also, we're creating more applications and the cloud has become the de facto standard for new workloads. So you hear about cloud-first initiatives, digital transformation, the cloud is central to that. You mentioned snapshotting, which is a relatively new phenomenon, although it's taken hold rapidly. How does snapshotting work in the cloud versus in your own prime environment? It's not wildly different at all. I think the snapshots is, again, a great first line of defense for helping users achieve very low recovery point objectives. So the frequency that they can protect their data, as well as very low recovery time objectives, how quickly they can recover the data. Because that's why we're backing up, right? We need the ability to recover. However, snapshots certainly have their limitations as well. They are not independent of the workload that is being protected. So if there were to be some sort of cybersecurity event, like ransomware that is prolific throughout pretty much every business, every vertical, when that snapshot is not independent, if the production system becomes compromised, that snapshot's likely to be compromised as well. And then going back to the recovery piece, we're not going to have something to recover from. And it's not a one and done with ransomware. Yeah, so how, so what is the role that backup plays? I mean, a lot of people, I feel like security is such a hot topic here at the show and just in general, attacks are coming in. Unique form factors for everyone. I mean, I feel like backup is, no pun intended, the backbone of a system here. How does that affect what you're creating? Yeah, absolutely. I think, like you say, the backup is a poor to any comprehensive security strategy, right? I think when we talk about security, everyone tends to focus on the preventative, the proactively stopping the bad guys from getting it. However, there is that remediative aspect as well. Because like you say, ransomware is relentless, right? You as a good guy have to pretty much fend off each and every single attack that comes your way. And that can be an infinite number of attacks. We're all human beings, we're fallible, right? And sometimes we can't defend against everything. So having a secure backup strategy as part of that remediative recovery component for a cybersecurity strategy is critical. And that includes things like encryption, immutability, logical separation of data, and so forth. We know that ransomware is a scourge on premises, typically begins with the end user workstation. How does ransomware work in the cloud? And do the cloud providers have adequate protections against ransomware or can they? Yeah, it's a fantastic question as well. I think when we look at the cloud, one of the common misconceptions is as we transition workloads to the cloud, we are transitioning responsibility to that cloud provider. And again, it's a misconception, right? It is a shared responsibility between the cloud provider and in this case AWS and the user. So as we transition these workloads across varying different services, infrastructure, platform, software as a service, we're always transitioning varying degrees of responsibility, but we always own our data and it is our responsibility to protect and secure that data. For the actual infrastructure components, the hardware that is on the onus of the cloud provider. So that's the major. Is ransomware as big a threat in the cloud as it is on-prem? Absolutely, there's no difference between a ransomware attack on premises or in the cloud, irrespective of where you're choosing to run your workloads. You need to have that comprehensive cybersecurity strategy in order to defend against that and ultimately recover as well if there's a successful attempt. Yeah, okay, let's get us out of the dark shadows real quick. And bring us back to a little bit of the business use case here, a lot of people using AWS, what do you think are some of the considerations they should have when they're thinking about this? Thinking about growing their use of AWS? Well, if we're going to stick down the cloud shadows, the cybersecurity piece. We can be the darkness. You're kind of a dark shadows business. We can go rainbows and unicorns, nice and happy if you like. I think there's a number of considerations they need to keep up. Security is number one. The next piece is around the recovery as well. I think folks, when we talk about backup and recovery, the focus is always on the backup piece of it, but again, we need to focus on why we're doing the backup is the recovery component. So making sure that we have a clean, verifiable backup that we're able to restore data from. Can we do that in an efficient and timely manner? And I think the other major consideration is looking at the entirety of our environments as well. Very few companies are 100% sole sourced on a single cloud provider. It is typically hybrid cloud. It's around 80% of organizations are hybrid. So they have the on-premises data and they also have workloads running in one or multiple clouds. And when it comes to backup and recovery of all of these different infrastructures and environments, the way that we approach it is very different and that often leads to multiple different point products from multiple different vendors. The average company utilizes three different backup products, sometimes as many as seven and that can introduce a management nightmare. It's very complex, very resource intensive, expensive. So looking at the entirety of the environment and looking to utilize a backup provider that can cover the entirety of that environment while centralizing everything under a single management console helps folks be a lot more efficient, a lot more cost effective and ultimately better when it comes to data protection. Amazon and all cloud providers really are increasingly making regions transparent. Just at this conference, Amazon introduced failover controls from multiple, multi-region access points. So you can failover from one access from one region to another. What kind of challenges does that present to you as a backup provider? I don't think it represents any challenges. When we look at the native durability of the cloud, we look at availability zones, we look at multi-region failover, that durability is ultimately founded on replication and I wouldn't say that replication and backup, you would use one or the other. I would say that they are complementary. So for replication, that is going to help with a failover scenario, that durability component, but then backup again is that independent company. If we look at replication, let's say the source data were to be compromised by ransomware or there was accidental deletion or corruption, that's simply going to be copied over to the target destination as well. Having that backup as an independent puppy again complements that strategy as well. Do you need it in either, in any scenario? In any scenario? I think the average person would probably say that backup is not the most exciting technology aspect of this industry, but you guys certainly made, built a great business on it. What excites you about what's coming in backup? What are the new technologies, new advancements that perhaps we haven't seen and productized yet that you think are going to change the game? I think actually what we offer right now is the most exciting piece, which is just choice, flexibility. So Veeam again is synonymous with VMware backup of we can cover a multitude of environments, including AWS, containerized workloads, Kubernetes, physical systems and the mobility pieces is critical because as organizations look to act on their digital transformation, cloud first initiatives, they need to be able to mobilize their workloads across different infrastructures, maybe from on-premises into the cloud, one cloud to another. Maybe it's cloud back to on-premises because we do also see that that flexibility of choice is what excites me about Veeam because it's ultimately giving that the users, best in class data protection tool sets without any prescriptive approach from us in terms of where you should be running your workloads. That is the choice of the user. Yeah, Veeam is definitely more than VMware. We actually had a chance to chat with y'all at KubeCon and CaliativeCon in Detroit. So we've seen the multitude of things that you touch. I want to bring it back to something and something kind of fun because you talked a lot about the community and being able to serve them. It's very clear. Actually, I shouldn't say it's very clear but to me it appears clear that community is a big priority for Veeam. I just want to call this out because this was one of the cooler pieces of swag. You all gave out a hundred massage guns. Okay, very hot topic, hot Christmas gift for 2022. I feel like I'm in white right now. And I was actually really compelled by this because we do a swag segment on theCUBE but it's not just about the objects or getting stuff. It's really about who's looking out for their community and how are they staying. Thanks, swag is a brand activation but it's also a thank you and I loved that you were giving out massage guns to the AWS heroes and community builders. What role does community play in the culture and the product development at Veeam? So community has always been at the heart of Veeam. If you haven't looked at pretty much every single development across all of our versions across all of our products is always stood by the community. We have a wonderful Veeam forum where we've got 400,000 less users actively providing feedback on the product, what they would like to see and that is ultimately what steers the direction of the product. Of course, market trends and technology. A couple other factors I'm sure. A couple other factors but community is huge for us and the same goes for AWS. So talking with the AWS heroes, the community builders helps Veeam reach further into that community and the AWS user base and empower those folks with data protection tools and massage guns when your feet are tired from being standing on them all day in Vegas. Yeah. Well, I mean everybody is working hard and it's nice to say thank you. So I love to hear that and it's clear from the breadth of products that you're creating and the ways that you're supporting your customers that you already take care a lot about community. We have a new challenge on theCUBE this year at AWS re-invent. Think of it as an Instagram reel of your thought leadership, your hot take on the show. Key themes as we look into 2023. What do you think is the most important story or trend or thing going on here in the show? I think it's just the continuation of cybersecurity and the importance of backup as a comprehensive cybersecurity strategy. Some folks might say that secure backup is your last line of defense. Again, ransomware is relentless. These folks are going to keep coming and even if that's successful, it's not a one and done thing. It's going to happen again and again and again. So we have a look around the show floor, the presentations, there's a huge cybersecurity focus and really just what folks should be doing as a best practice to secure their AWS environment. Well, Paul, any final thoughts or questions? I just quickly, you've mentioned data security. You mentioned data protection and backup sort of interchangeably, but they're not really the same thing, are they? I mean, what businesses you see VM as being in? I would say that we are a data protection company because of, yes, there is backup, but there's also the replication component. There's the continuous data protection component where we've got near zero RTOs. And then we, again, look at the cybersecurity components of that. What can we do to really protect that data? So I would say that the two are different. Backup is a subset of data protection. Sam, thank you so much for being here with us on theCUBE. It's been a super insightful conversation. Hopefully, we'll get you back soon. And more of the teams, they seem to be celebrities here with us on theCUBE. Paul Gillan, thank you so much for being here with me. Pleasure, Savannah. And I'm glad we get to celebrate our first reinvent and most importantly, thank you to the audience for tuning in without you. We don't get to hang out here in fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada where we're live from the show floor at AWS Reinvent. My name is Savannah Peterson with Paul Gillan. We're theCUBE, and we are the leading source for high tech coverage.