 Live from Las Vegas, it's theCUBE. Covering Informatica World 2018. Not to you by Informatica. Hey, welcome back everyone. We're here live in Las Vegas at the Venetian Hotel, ballroom, main floor. Here's theCUBE out in the open. I'm John Furrier with my co-host, Peter Burris, this week for the next two days. Our next guest is Richard Ganley, Senior Vice President, Digital, Transformation Solutions, and Global Partners for Informatica. Richard, great to see you. Thanks for coming on. Thank you for having me. We have three Palo Alto people in Vegas. We probably all flew out here last night, but Informatica's doing great. You're dealing with a lot with the digital transformation. Dealing with the big, large projects and partners, global partners. The ecosystem here is getting robust and we're going to expect to hear some announcements. We don't yet have the news in hand, but we hear some big ecosystem kind of announcements coming. I'm not sure you can talk about it, but talk about the ecosystem and the partner relationship that you guys are having with your customers. Sure, absolutely. Well, I would look at it like this. We've got many of our partners here, and part of the reason for that is, the issue many of our customers are trying to solve now, we call it digital transformation, but I think it's analogous to what happened about 20 years ago, when the internet was first really coming into our lives, people were getting online in large numbers, and many companies were scrambling for a strategy. They were worried about born internet organizations who'd already started to get online, but they're particularly worried about companies who looks a bit like them who might get there first. And if we go to where we are today, many companies now, they're trying to unleash the power of data, they're trying to turn all of that data they've got into some strategic advantage. And sure, customers of ours are worried about the likes of Amazon and Tesla to informatica customers who are obviously very data driven, but they're also worried about organizations who are very much like them, and what would happen if they unlocked the power of their data first? So we see some of our customers trying to get ahead, trying to steal a march on companies that look very much like them, but also many organizations just struggling to find that place to start. And I think this is such a big problem, part of the reason so many of our partners are here is because it'll take us all working together for the benefit of our customers to solve these very, very complex problems. I wonder if it's actually worse than it was 20 years ago though, right, because 20 years ago, your general arrangement of assets, which pretty much every industry is defined by having relatively common arrangement of assets, you introduce data into that, it reduces asset specificities, you make things programmable, which means not only are you worried about companies that look like you, potentially you're worried about companies that look nothing like you, because data can quickly make them look like you. How does that play out into, as your partners are thinking about their businesses, how they engage customers, I got a following question for that as well. Yeah, it's a good question, Peter. I think the dynamic there, what is forcing people to do is to come up with a plan. You know, I don't think anybody can sit and wait to figure out what their plan's going to be for data. They need to do something today. So we see many of our customers very much in a hurry now. And I think boards of directors have woken up to the reality that they need to do something. So it has become a boardroom issue, but we see many boards now employing new titles, just like we saw 20 years ago when the internet came along, new titles being created like Chief Digital Officer, you know, Chief Data Officer, Chief Analytics Officer, many of these new titles, new budgets becoming available. But the hardest point for many is finding that starting point. And I think that's where many of our partners come in, is you know, many of our customers, they'll turn to us, but they'll also turn to our partners for strategic advice. So it's important for us all to work together because we've all got different skills that are part of the overall solution. But one of the challenges I think everybody in the technology industry has is that historically, partnership arrangements have been tied to what industry are you in? What size company are you working with? And as digital takes root, it's going to change that very understanding of what kind of business is that customer in? What size are they going to be? What size can they be? Is that starting to affect how you manage partners as well? How you manage relationships with your partners? I think it is. We're having to look at things very differently. I think many of our partners, they're changing as well. They're changing their businesses to deal with the changes in the world. You know, as our customers become data driven, the business world is becoming disrupted. Now our partners are going through that too. I think all businesses are fundamentally changing the way they do business, and it's the same for our partners. So I think the whole world, you know, even society is going through the same thing at the same time. We're all having to think differently about what we do and it's data, data's changing the lives of everybody on the planet and every single business at the same time, including our partners. I got to ask you a question. The reality that we're hearing from customers is that there's a major shift going on with data and you outlined them. But now combine that shift with like a couple of rooms in the house on burning off fire, like GDPR. So you have this shift going on, right? So more than ever, they need partners. So like what we're hearing is, okay, we're used to dealing with a lot of regulations and data to, oh my God, we've been fast and loose, just trying to scale up and scale out with the cloud and whatnot. Now I need help. They need help like right now. They don't need like a 10 year project or a six month project, they need stuff like instantly. How will you guys bring in those partners to the table? What does a customer do? What does a prospect do if they say, hey Informatica, you guys are the Switzerland of data, get the catalog and stuff, MDM, I like the story. I want to move on this. What do I do? What do you guys, what do you say to that? I mean, obviously it's a good prospect, but. Is a great question. And for most of our customers, that's the hardest thing is where to get started. What we see is, and this theme runs through our conference, there are four journeys that we see our customers going on. It's 360, getting a single view of their customers and their products, governing their data, number two, and number three, moving to the cloud or hybrid and fourthly, next generation analytics. Putting data in the hands of business people who can use it to serve customers and run their business better. We see all of our customers, they typically will start in one of these areas and it really depends on what's most pressing and burning in their business. So if GDPR is an issue for them, that's typically where they'll start. They'll start with governance, but also at the same time, as many people are looking at GDPR, they're seeing that if they can govern all of their data, build a solid foundation, they'll be in a great position for the future. So that is actually a really, really good starting point. And GDPR has been a goodness, I think, it's driven a lot of the right behaviors and it's woken a lot of people up to the realities that they need to govern their data. We've been getting involved in a lot of the partnership conversations with the Q, obviously we have a lot of interviews with suppliers and their partners. You're in charge of global partners. What does that mean? And what are you doing to get them to be more effective, either working together with each other or with Informatica and with the customer? How are you growing the partner network? What's the value purpose? Take a minute to explain the value proposition for the partners. Yeah, so I think for partners, there's never been a better time to partner with Informatica. These are great times. I think as I was saying at the beginning, the world is becoming data-driven and this is perfect. I think where our partners really come in is around those four journeys that I mentioned, they've all got different expertise on different parts of the journey and we're aligned with partners who've got different skills that we can use. So for example, if a customer's looking to solve for GDPR and they want to become data-driven, they want to govern their data, we'll work with partners who've got those special skills, whether it's on the implementation side, whether it's business consulting, whether it's strategy, all kinds of different partners will support us and really for our customers, that gives them a much richer solution. Who are you trying to attract? Because as you guys are growing, obviously we would predict that given the value proposition of Informatica, you're going to probably have some growth there. What's your value proposition to pitch to people that might not yet be a partner? What are you offering them? What's the incentive? What would you say to the people watching that might be a potential partner that say, hey, I want to join the Informatica Partner Network? Yeah, for many of our newer partners, we signed up a huge number of new partners last year and I think one of the value propositions is that as the world's become data-driven, we need our partners. This is perfect timing. There's never been a better time to come and work with us. I think we've got great solutions, many great products that our partners can complement our solutions around. So I think the timing's perfect and we also welcome new partners as well. So I think this is a great time for our partners to build their business with Informatica. It's a great time to be a partner. It's a great time to be a customer and it's a great time to be in... So you bring them business growth together, grow together kind of philosophies at the kitchen, right? Yeah, I think it's all about growing together. The market's growing really, really fast. Our customers need help immediately right now and between us and our partners, we're in the perfect position to help them. Richard, great stuff. Thanks for coming on. Great to meet you here in Las Vegas. This is Palo Alto Native. Resident, of course with two other Palo Alto residents here at the Informatica World 2018. Day one of two days of coverage with theCUBE exclusively here in Las Vegas live. Stay with us for more day one coverage after this short break.