 Live from Las Vegas, it's theCUBE. Covering Discover 2016 Las Vegas. Brought to you by Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Now, here are your hosts, John Furrier and Dave Vellante. Okay, welcome back everyone. We're here live in Las Vegas for HPE HPE Enterprise, Discover 2016. This is SiliconANGLE Media's flagship program, theCUBE, where we go out to the events and extract the signal from the noise. I'm John Furrier with my co-host, Dave Vellante. Next guest is Neeraj Kohel, VP of Global Marketing and Product Management for HPE Storage and Trevor Jackson, Director of IT Infrastructure at SoCAN Society of Composers, Authors, Music Publishers. So, I can't wait to talk about Spotify, iTunes, and all the digital transformations. Welcome to theCUBE. Thank you, thank you for having me. Neeraj, great to see you. So, storage, let's start with the storage. You guys have a great story. We're going to talk about it here today. Number one, you guys have announcements. Good numbers on the board, but really, the fruit is coming off the tree on the composable, because it really highlights, not only a good marketing way to understand, but it really is where the market's going on the consumption, and ultimately, if people build out that next generation, it's, they want to compose. It's very dev-opt, it's very app-focused, has a good vibe to it. Share with us that vision and how that relates to what Trevor's here to talk about. Sure, yeah, so the composable vision has been really born out of what our customers really need, right? I mean, if you look at storage industry evolution, it has really evolved from being sort of a NAS, or SAN, and how many of each do you want, to a new modern, the modern framework, which is really around what we'd like to simplify into a service-level optimized, which is a system-defined model, and perhaps a capacity or cost-optimized end of the spectrum, which is how we think about our software-defined spectrum. And there are needs on both sides. So, we kept on simplifying the portfolio for our customers, and got to distill it down to these two points. In that, now let's talk about the software-defined, which is where a lot of the composability comes in. I think the need is, there are workloads and scenarios, like remote offices, where you need something really simple. Turns on very quickly, gets up, you don't need an IT staff, you need networking gurus there, trying to set it together. But what we saw happening in the industry is a lot of that movement was creating yet another island. And that should not be the case, because that has long-term costs and repercussions to our customers, because if you just put in a hyper-converged box and it's just not connected with anything else, you're sort of creating a problem for tomorrow. So, let's talk about, Trevor, obviously the music business, digital transformations, all about a new kind of consumption at the consumer level. So, the rights and the business models in media has changed, certainly, whether you're talking about movies or music. The freemium business model has become very prevalent, yet the consumption side leads to actually more conversion. Some people have seen success with that. It's obviously the piracy thing. DRM has been a big hot button. That must be a huge challenge, because now you have a composability issue on the consumption side to your customers. How do you guys look at that from a storage perspective, because that's where the digital assets are stored. So, can you just give us a landscape view of your challenges and how the HP storage fit into that? So, we've been around for a very long time since 1925, and traditionally, a big part of our business has been regular television and radio stations, and over the last 10 or 15 years or so, we've seen the explosion of digital streaming, as you mentioned, services like Spotify and Netflix and whatnot. So, one of the challenges that we have is being able to aggregate all the data and information that we're receiving from the performances, and ensuring that the creators of the music are properly compensated for their work. Yeah, and that's gets complicated now with Facebook Live, and I got, I'm at a game or I'm in a theater, I'm gonna be streaming from my phone now. So, how do you get your arms around this? Take us through. I mean, it's intoxicating just to think about it. I mean, it's a big data problem, and we're using our traditional methods of tackling it. We're also looking at some of the big buzzwords, like machine learning and blockchain and whatnot, but it's a continual learning experience for us, and we're doing what we can to ensure that we keep track of what's being played, so we ensure that the proper rights holders are compensated. What is it meant for your business, this whole, I mean, it must have been exploding. I mean, in the 70s, you'd make tapes, and everybody was doing that, right? And now, you don't, you purchase them, or some people don't, they try to get around it, but what is it meant for your business, this whole digital trend? Well, I mean, we're seeing a shift, and it's not quite there yet, but you know, you heard of the term court cutters. You know, a lot of people are dropping traditional television, and going with Netflix and Amazon Prime, for example. The same things happening to the music industry. Directly, people are not buying as many CDs as they used to. They are going to iTunes, and they're purchasing CDs, but are purchasing tracks. The other alternative that they're now making the shift towards is not even buying the tracks anymore. They're actually just streaming them, so they don't even own them. They just want to listen to it. They want to listen to the information, so. For us, again, it's been a huge increase in the volume of data that we've had to analyze. The business model's changed. I mean, look at one of these, I was talking to a friend who works at Apple, and they already announced it, but Taylor Swift was instrumental in there, and she kind of held out, but the old business model was, you produce some music, you go on tour, and then, but now the pressure to do another cut, or I don't have albums anymore, but sets of music is so hard between the cycles that you see people doing things differently than artists. They'll cut a deal with Apple, or they'll put some free music out there. What have you learned? What's the big aha that you guys have come to in talking to the artists? Because at the end of the day, the art is the key, right? What's the new model? I think the new model for us, I mean, if you go on YouTube anytime, within five or six clicks, you'll find a potential upcoming new artist. I think that's really changed the way that new talent is discovered, and we're looking at ways how we can use that data to find the next big thing. So what has this all meant for your storage infrastructure? You had tons more data, a lot more diversification. Paint us a picture. What's your infrastructure look like? How is it evolving? So when I joined the organization about six years ago, we had a flat sand, it was a traditional sand, and then we had some issues, or some challenges with the volume of data at the time. So we went with a tiered solution, and about two and a half years into that acquisition, we actually outgrew it. Two and a half years before we actually wanted to replace it. So that was a performance issue? It was a performance issue. Okay, so tiering was a stop gap that didn't, the gap wasn't big enough for you. Exactly, so things changed so rapidly for us. So not me hitting so fast. Yeah, we quickly outgrew it. So we started looking at other solutions, and again, they were tiered as well, but when I went to discover a couple of years ago, and I saw the presentation on how HPEE and 3PAR are making the move to making flash the same price as spinning disk, I was very much intrigued. Caught your attention. Caught my attention. Okay, so what happened? So I met with some of the product engineers and had a discussion. How are you guys, what's the voodoo, what's the magic behind all of this, right? What are you telling me? It's true, it's true. Yeah, so we had a really good discussion and I came away from it very much impressed with what I saw. When I went back to Toronto, where I'm originally from, I brought my team down to the HPE headquarters there, and we had a deeper dive and we all walked away with the conclusion that this was the direction we should be taking. Okay, how big now? I mean, how does it grow now, size-wise? Size-wise, I mean, I think we're very well positioned. One of the things I really liked about the product itself is, you know, whether we go with the 7450, which is what we have, our 7200 or the, you know, 8400 or whatever, it's down the line, it's one unified OS. So for my team to be able to manage from the platform we're on today, if we need to increase the capacity. Do you have a headroom? Basically you got a ton of headroom. Oh, we've got tons of headroom and, you know, the learning curve is pretty much non-existent, going from one product line to the next. What was the business pressure? I mean, we just watching Star Trek trailer, which is a big announcement with HPE. Yeah, it's like, you know, Scotty, you need more power, you know, fire everything. I mean, the pressure in IT is pretty heavy right now. So you got to, you're the one getting the phone call. I need faster. I mean, was that the environment like? Are you guys holding on? I mean, what was it like back in you guys before you moved over? Yeah, I mean, that was the pressure. We do what we call a distribution once a quarter. And we have a deadline we have to meet for the people to get their royalties, the performers to get their royalties. And because of the volume information, we found that the cushion that we had through processing the data and then paying out on that, it started getting smaller and smaller and it's only going to get worth as time went on. Those royalty checks are pretty important to these artists, don't you think? Oh, absolutely. Phone will ring off the hook if they don't get them. Absolutely. So Niraj, I wonder if we get your take on the what's going on in storage. You're new to storage. I am. You're, you got a software background. So what do you think of this sort of insulated world of storage? What are your perspectives as somebody who's not been entrenched in this business? The rare non-storage storage person. That's right. Yeah. Like I said, I joined somebody's family, a large storage family recently, right? Interesting. Quick aside, the guys who invented three-par were all non-storage guys. So there you go. That's right. Yeah, three-par in fact benefits a lot from the fact that they were actually more of an OS guys, right? Yeah, right. They all grew up in the OS world and then moved to storage. So still infrastructure? Still infrastructure, yeah. Yeah, I wasn't from the software application space, but you know, that's why it's so relevant because what is happening in storage fundamentally is two transitions from what I said, right? One is software defined. So really trying to see what capabilities can go into the software layer. But the other is application-centric. So storage should start looking more like an engine of a car where it is important, it's critical, and it has to be right, but very few drivers actually think much about the engine while they're driving. So it has to be something which is exposed in the application model and application framework and in the applications lingo. And we're seeing that all around us, whether it is from VM-centricity or whether it is from the application-centricity. So I think those are the two dimensions where storage is sort of coming closer to where I was in some ways, right? So that's exciting. The other part of course is the amount of innovation that's happening in trying to make storage really as a service into your composable question earlier. It's about how does the storage participate as a first-class service into a composable set of pools of services. And that's really I think what is interesting as well. The traditional storage absolutely is critical and very important still. I mean in terms of the system-defined environments, hardware accelerated, and we excel with 3-Power as you've already heard. But I think it's also trying to get further up the stack, which is interesting for me. What does that mean for storage to be more application-centric? Is it knowledge of the application or data that can feed the application, workload specificity, elaborate on that? Yeah, it could mean a lot of things. And I think there's an evolution path to further and further on that dimension, right? But today what it really means is being aware of the application, being able to be controlled from the application. So you think about storage optimization, you think about the protection aspects of it. Let the application derive and drive the policies that you need to drive storage. So rather than having a storage admin do all of that separately, let the app admin do as much of that possible so that it's easier for them. So that's what today's state of the art is. Where I think it could go further, certainly, is where now it is completely hidden from the application that there is, in fact, a storage layer, right? You essentially are talking the application language and storage just works basically. So Trevor, how does that resonate with you? The near-term piece where there's some application specificity in long-term where storage is invisible. And what does that mean to you and what does that mean to your organization going forward? I mean, to me, as an infrastructure person, it means a lot because if we did couple the storage from the application, it allows us to be more agile, allows us to make quicker business decisions. And for us, especially with the way that the industry is moving, it's moving very quickly, so we need that agility. Do you have to reorganize your skill sets or is it more just allowing people who used to provision lungs to go off and do other things? Can you talk about that a little bit? Not necessarily. I mean, we're heavily project-based internally, but one of the great things about the three-part is that it's very easy to manage. So the last time that my team spends managing the product, we can put them towards a project. Projects are going to add value to the business and to the members. So what does project-based mean from a storage perspective? I got a project, I need some storage, make it as simple as possible, and then get out of my way, is that? Launching a new, like for example, we have what are called tariffs. A new tariff may come online, like for example, satellite radio, just as an example may be a new tariff. So getting our storage and our systems ready to handle that new tariff, because sometimes what happens within Canada, especially, is a tariff will be proposed and it'll sit in courts for a couple of years, but in the meantime, all the information is being collected, right? So we have a backlog and all of a sudden one day, we may have to distribute all that information so we get a huge influx of data that we have to process. So from a speed and capacity perspective, this is where Flash comes into play for us. What's your data protection philosophy or approach? Well we do online backups, we do disk to disk and then we synchronize or replicate to a remote site. Asynchronously or? Asynchronously, yeah. Okay, and is that changing in any way? Is that working for you? Is it meeting your RPO, RTO? Oh absolutely, yeah it is. I mean, we're not saving lives, but we want to make sure that if you have a disaster that we're able to bring the business back online quickly. Sure, I got to ask you as we wrap up here, everyone wants to know, I'm sure I do as well. What do you recommend is the best streaming device that artists approve? Oh boy, I shouldn't put myself on that. Streaming device or streaming service. I mean, mobile devices, they're great. They're with you everywhere. I pretty much can work off of my mobile devices exclusively. So I would say probably any mobile device and frankly, I'm an Android guy, so off the same Android. And you're a Spotify now. We all know there, yeah. That's getting a little good. So I say, people ask me what, you know, Rob Hawkins, I'm a party of business right down the middle. I take no sides, you know. Whatever supports business is good for me. Well, congratulations and great story because I think that's exactly some of the things we've been hearing about composability is give me what I need, get the headroom, and easy to manage. Congratulations. Thanks so much for sharing the insights here in the CUBE, HP Storage. Number one, the composability's hot. Products are coming to the market really heavy, good stuff and the fruit is coming off the tree. Big time, congratulations. Thank the HP Storage Group and good to see the software guys coming in into the storage group. Thanks so much. Thank you for being so sanity. Thank you, Rob. Thanks so much. We appreciate it. Thanks so much. This is the CUBE, live here in Las Vegas. I'm John Furrier, Dave Vellante. You're watching the CUBE. We'll be right back.