>> Live from Las Vegas It's theCUBE! Covering the AWS Accenture Executive Summit. Brought to you by Accenture. >> Welcome back everyone to theCUBE's live coverage of the AWS Executive Summit here at the Venetian. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight. We have two guests for this segment. We have Akhtar Saeed, VP Solution Delivery, Southern Glazers Wine and Spirits, and Michael Noel, Managing Director Applied Intelligence at Accenture. Thank you so much for coming on the show. >> Thank you. >> Thank you for having us. >> I think this is going to be a fun one. We're talking about wine and spirits. >> Absolutely. (laughs) >> Akhtar, tell our viewers a little bit about Southern Glazer. >> Yeah, so Southern Glazer Wine and Spirits is a privately held company. We are in about 44 states, and we are the largest distributor of wine and spirits. >> Okay, in 44 states. What was the business problem you were trying to solve in terms of the partnership that you formed with Accenture? >> Yeah, so we started this initiative before Southern and Glazer merged. >> And that was in? >> It was 2016. So southern was already looking at how to enhance our technology, how to provide better data analytics, and how to create one source of truth. So that's what drove this and we were looking to partner with appropriate system integrator and right technology to be able to help deliver well if the company to be able to do analytics and data analysis. >> So you had two separate companies merging together and I like this idea, one source of truth. What does that mean, what did that mean for you? >> Well what it means to us is that since you have quite a few data marts out there and everybody is looking at the numbers a little differently, we spend a lot of time trying to say, hey is this right or is this right? So we want to bring all the data together saying this is what the data is and this is how we're going to standardize it, that's what we're trying to do. >> Okay, so this one source, now, Michael, in terms of that, is that a common, common issue particularly among companies that are merging would you say? >> No absolutely you have businesses that might be in the same industry but they might have different processes to try to get to the same answer, right, and the answer's never really the same. So having this concept of a clean room that allows you to take your various aspects of a business and combine that from a data point of view, a business metrics point of view and a business process point of view, this one source, helps you consolidate and streamline that so you can see that integrated view across your new business model really. >> So where do you begin? So you bring in Accenture and AWS and where do you start? >> So like you've mentioned, in 2016, Glazer and Southern Wine Spirits came together and merged, it actually accelerated process because we needed what Mike mentioned as a clean room where we could put this data and won't have to merge at data centers on day one and have the reporting, common reporting platform being available for the new SGWS and that's what we started so we said, okay what is the key performance indicators, the key metrics that we need going into day one? and that's what we want to populate the data with to begin with to make sure that information is available when the day one for merger comes through. >> Okay and so what were those indicators? >> There were several indicators, there were several business reports, people needed the supply chain, they needed to understand the data, what the inventory looks like they needed to know how we were doing across the markets. So all those indicators, that's what we put together. >> Okay, okay, and so how do you work with the client in this respect, how do you and AWS sort of help the client look at what the core business challenges are and then say okay, this is how we're going to attack this problem? >> Right, no that's a good question. I think the main thing is understanding, what does the business need? and how is the technology going to support what the business needs, right? that's first and foremost, right, and then getting alignment and understanding that is really what drives a roadmap to say here's what we're going to do, here's the order we're going to do it in and here's the value that we expect to get out of following these steps one by one and I think one thing we learned is you have to be directionally correct, you may not be exact but as long as we're making progress in the right direction, you course correct as you need to, right, based upon as the business learns new things and as the market changes and what not and that's really how we accomplish this. >> And is it a co-creative process or, how closely are you working with Accenture and AWS? >> Oh, very closely with Accenture and AWS, it's very co-creative, I mean we are really working hand-in-hand. I mean, as Mike alluded, you start certain ways a journey and you realize, gee, this may work but I have to change a little bit here and there's several time we had to change team's direction how to get there and how to approach it and to deliver value. >> Well let's talk, let's get into the nitty gritty with the architecture and components. So what did this entail, coming to this clean room, this one source of truth? >> Yeah, AWR architecture is based on AWS' platform or Accenture's AIP, Accenture Insights platform which runs on AWS and we have, what we did right from the beginning we said we're going to have a data link, we're going to have a hadoop environment where we're going to all our data there And then for analytics research we're going to use Redshift, on top of that for reporting we use Tableau, and we have a homegrown tool called Compass for reporting also that we use. So that's how we initially started, initially we were feeding data directly into it, because we needed to stand the system up relatively quickly. The advantage to us, we didn't have to deal with infrastructure, that was all set up at AWS, we just to need to make sure we load our data and make sure we make the reports available. >> Were you going to add something to that? >> Yeah I know that the concept around, because the merger is expediting this clean room which allows you to stand up an analytics as a service model, to start bringing your data, to start building out your reporting analytics quickly right, which should really speak to market to understanding their position, as an integrated company was so important. So building the Accenture Insights platform on the AWS platform, was a huge success in order to allow them to start going down that path.. >> Yeah I want to hear about some of the innovative stuff you're doing around data analytics and really let's bring it back down to earth too and say actually so this is what we could learn and see, in terms of what was selling what was not selling, what were you finding out? >> So at this point we have about 6000 users on the platform approximately. Initially we had some challenges, I'll be very frank upfront, that everything does not go smooth. That's where we then say "Okay what do I do differently?" We started with dense storage, nodes and we soon found it's not meeting our needs. Then we enhanced Tougaloo dense cluster, and they helped us by about by 70%, that it drove the speed, but the queue length was still long, with Redshift we were still not getting the performance we needed. Then we went to second generation of dense computers and clusters and we got some more leverage, but really the breakthrough came when we said "we need to really reevaluate "how we've been doing our workload management." Some of our queries were very short term report queries real quick, others were loading data that took a while. And that's the challenge we had to overcome, with the workload management we were able to create, where we were able to bump queries and send them to different directions and create that capacity. And that's what really had a breakthrough in terms of technology for us, till that time we were struggling, I'll be honest, but once we got that breakthrough, we were able to comfortably deliver what business needed from data perspective and from businesses perspective. Mike would you like to add... >> Yeah, in addition to AWS, using Redshift has really been a really important, I guess decision and solution in place here, because not only are we using it for loading massive amounts of data, but it's also being used for power users, to generate very adhoc and large queries, to be able to support other analytic type needs right? And I think Redshift has allowed us to scale quickly as we needed to based upon certain times of year, certain market conditions or whatever, Redshift has really allowed us to do that. In order to support where the business demands have really grown exponentially since we've been putting this in place. And it all starts with architecting, and we said, and delivering all around the data. And then how do you enable the capabilities, not just data as a foundation but you know real time analytics, and looking at what looking at what could be, you know, forecasting and predicting what's happening in the future, using artificial intelligence, machine learning and that's really where the platform is taking us next. >> I want to talk about that, but I want to ask you quickly about the skills challenge, because introducing a new technology, there's going to be maybe some resistance and maybe simply your workers aren't quite up to speed. So can you talk a little bit about what you experienced, and then also how you overcame it? >> Yeah, I mean we had several challenges, I mean I'll put it in two big buckets, one is just change management. Anytime you're changing technology on this many users, they're comfortable with something they know, a known commodity, here's something new, that's a challenge. And one should not ignore, we need to pay a lot of attention on how to manage change. That's one, second challenge was within the technical group itself, because we were changing technology on them also right, and we had to overcome the skill sets, we were not the company, who were using open source a lot. So we had to overcome that and say how do we train our folks, how do we get knowledge? And in that case Accenture was great partner with us, they helped us tremendously and AWS professional services, they were able to help us and we had a couple of folks from professional services, they had really helped us with our technology to help drive that change. So you have to tackle from both sides, but we're doing pretty well at this point, we have found our own place, where we can drive through this together. >> In terms of what you were talking about earlier, in terms of what is next with predictive analytics and machine learning, can you talk a little bit about the most exciting things that are coming down the pipeline in terms of Southern Glazer? >> I think that's a great question, I think there's multiple way to look at it. From a business point of view right it's, how do they gain further insights by looking at as much different data sets as possible, right, whether it be internal data, external data, how do we combine that to really understand the customers better? And looking at how they approach things from a future point of view, we've been able to predict what's going to happen in the marketplace so I think it's about looking at all the different possible datasets out there and combining that to really understand what they can do from an art of the possible point of view. >> Can you give us some examples of terms of combining data sets so you're looking at, I mean, drinking patterns or what do we have here? >> I mean you have third party data, right, and TD links and those kind of things, you pull that data in and then you have our own data, then we have data from suppliers right, so that where we combine it and say okay what is this telling me, what story is this putting together telling me? I don't think we are there all the way, we have started on the journey, right now we are at what I call the, this one source of truth and we still have some more sub-editors loading to it, but that's the vision that, how do we pull in all that information and create predictive analysis down the road and be able to see what that means and how we'll be driving? >> And so you're really in the infancy of this? >> Yes, I mean it's a journey right, some may say that you're not in infancy, you're in the middle somewhere, somebody said, if they were ahead of us, it's all depending where you want to put this on that chart but we at least have taken first steps and we have one place where the data's available to us now, we're just going to keep adding to it and now it's a matter of how should we start to use it? >> In terms of lessons that you've learned along the way and you've been very candid in talking about some of the challenges that you've had to overcome but what would you say are some of the biggest takeaways that you have from this process? >> Yeah the biggest takeaway for me would be, as I've already mentioned, change management, don't ignore that, pay attention to that because that's what really drives it, second one that I'll say is probably, have a broader vision but when you execute make sure you look at the smaller things that you can measure, you can deliver against because you would have to take some steps to adjust to that so those are the two things, the third have the right partners with you because you can't go alone on this, you need to make sure you understand who you're going to work with and create a relation with them and saying "hey it's okay to have tough conversations", we have plenty of challenging conversations when we were having issues but it's as a team how you overcome those and deliver value, that's what matters. >> High praise for you Michael (laughs) at Accenture here, but what would you say in terms of being a partner with Southern Glazer and having helped and observed this company, what would you say are some of the biggest learnings from your perspective? >> Oddly enough I think the technology's the easier part of all this, right, I think that's fair to say without a doubt but really I think, really focusing on making the business successful, right, if everything you do is tied around making the business successful, then the rest will just kind of, you know, go along the way right because that's really the guiding principles right and then you saw that with technology right and that's really I think what we've learned most and foremost is, bring the business along, right, educating them and understanding what they really need and focusing on listening, alright, and trying to answer those specific questions, right, I think that's really the biggest factor we've learned over the past journey, yeah. >> And finally so we're here at AWS re:Invent, 60,000 people descending here on Sin City, what most excites you about, why do you come first of all and most excites you about the many announcements and innovations that we're seeing here this week? >> Yeah, so I'll be honest, this is the first time I've come to this conference but it's been really exciting, what excites me about these things is the new innovation, you learn new things, you say "hey, how can I go back "and apply this and do something different "and add more value back?" That's what excites me. >> Now, no I think you're absolutely right, I think, AWS is obviously a massive disruptor across any industry and their commitment to new technology, new innovation and the practicality of how we can start using some of that quickly I think is really exciting, right, because we've been working on this journey for a while and now there's some things that they've announced today, I think that we can go back and apply it pretty quickly, right, to really even further accelerate Southern Glazer's, you know, pivot to being a fully digital company. >> So a fully digital company, this is my last question (laughs) sorry, your advice for a company that is like yours, about to embark on this huge transformation, as you said, don't ignore the change management, the technology can sometimes be the easy part but do you have any other words of wisdom for a company that's in your shoes? >> All the words of wisdom I'll have is just I think I've already mentioned, three things they'll probably need to focus on, just take the first step, right, that's the hardest part, I think Anne even said this morning that some companies just never take the first step, take that first step and you have to, this is where the industry is going and data is going to be very important so you have to take the first step saying how do I get better, handle on the data. >> Excellent, great. Well Michael, Akhtar, thank you so much for coming on theCUBE this has been a real pleasure, thinking about Southern Glazer, next time bring some alchohol. >> Absolutely. (laughs) It's Vegas! >> Thank you, appreciate it. >> Great. I'm Rebecca Knight, we'll have more of theCUBE's live coverage of the AWS executive summit coming up in just a few moments, stay with us. (light music)