>>From the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas. It's the cube covering UI path forward for brought to you by UI path. >>Welcome back to Las Vegas. Live the cube. Yes, it's live in Las Vegas at the Bellagio. Lisa Martin, with Dave Alante, we are covering UI path forward for very excited to be here, talking with customers, UI path, employees, partners, lots of great conversations going on about automation and the acceleration that we're seeing, especially in the last 18 months. We've got two guests here with me today to talk about emerging technologies, specifically continuous process discovery. Please welcome Paula Katikia VP of product management at UI path and Layla Deleage CIO and digital officer at Coca Cola. Ladies, welcome to >>The program. Thank you. It's great to be here. So let's >>Talk about public. Let's start with you. Continuous process discovery. Define that for us. What does that mean? >>So process discovery has been, um, a concept that's been around for awhile, right? It's enterprises have a bunch of processes that are deployed and people are following them. Um, the concept of discovery has existed. What we're trying to do with continuous process discovery is enable you to identify the processes, figure out how to optimize them and then automate them once they're automated, we want to monitor them and then keep doing that cycle over and over again, using technology rather than having fill in, having people fill in paperwork and then having those processes go out of, um, out of, um, status, like right away, because they're just becoming stale with continuous process discovery. They don't become stale. You're getting that real time feedback loop and you're getting the processes to work and to end continuously. >>So I wonder if I could follow up on that because I remember when you guys made the acquisition of process gold. And so as somebody who's heavily involved in product management, how did you go about, I mean, it's been, sounds like it's seamless, but it never is. Right. But how did you go about integrating and making it appear as though it's just kind of part of the platform? >>I mean, there's a lot goes into that right. Process gold was a great technology to begin with. So it wasn't a huge stretch for us to take it and integrate it and make it part of the platform. Um, typically when we acquire companies, we look for product market fit. We look for a technology fit. We look for people fit and we had that with process gold. The other thing to add there is a process discovery, um, specifically with Parsis gold and automation go hand in hand, you can't having one without the other is kind of leaving half of your solution on the table and just focusing on understanding and not focusing on implementation. And so it was very easy to take that technology and make it part of the hyper automation platform. >>Well, the reason why I asked that question is because it sort of coincides with a customer's journey where you go from sort of a individual department. And then now you're saying, I always say pave the cow path. And I kind of take a process that I know I'll just implement that even might not be the best I'm going to repeat and takes you to a new realm. And so this is, to me, this is all about how incumbent companies, a hundred plus year old companies can actually be digital disruptors as opposed to being disrupted themselves. Right? A lot of smart people running these big companies. So last time we talked, you were relatively new inside of a year. So how's the journey going. And, and how does it tie in to some of the advancements that UI path has made? Yeah, >>Absolutely. So the journey is going great. I like to work to use accelerate. So I'm here to accelerate and transform and why we have to do it is so that we don't become obsolete and we continue to be relevant for our customers, for our employees. They're important and for our community. So the are doing a lot of finished running a lot of initiatives. When you look at being relevant for the customer, that means we have to transform the way we operate and our business models. We have to generate new revenue streams now that are enabled and based on data and technology, while you do that, you have to create efficiency internally. You cannot create great experiences with customers and you work with very monolithic and very old school, traditional processes or based off working and systems. So you have to make sure that you adapt and change and transform the way you work internally to meet the customer's needs and demand and generate these new business models. >>So our starting position was automation. We have to automate at an extreme speed, but we also wanted to go really far without automation, not just fast and hit with task automation and just automate these traditional 50, 60 year old processes, but have Doobie identify what else is there? There's a wealth of opportunity when you look at an end to end process. So that's where process mining as Polak described, comes into play. And actually we started affiliating with process mining during process gold. So your question around how the integration went, we actually went through that. I think the UI pads, one key value that they have, and they should never use is listening to the customer. So the got to get her with iPads. And we said, there's more to what we can do with automation. And we implemented process mining for one end to end process, amazing results, just one country, one end to end process, amazing results. But it's because of the partnership. We know what we need to achieve, but we have to do, and they know how to help us to get the technology up and running or adapt to technology and improve the technology. So that's where we are achieving outcomes. We are generating new business model, new revenue stream, automating internally re-skilling and up-skilling our people, which is extremely important that comes along with automation that redesign exciters sorry, but that redesign a work is >>Very important in the CEO's role is very important in that as well. I wanted to talk though about something that you just said with respect to the listening piece that you have is so good at this morning in the keynote. Mary said too, you know, all that, which was standing room only, which was amazing to see, um, in this day and age, but that they wanted to hear from customers. What are we doing? Right? What are we not doing that you want to see more of? What do you want to see less of? Talk to me about the direction and advice that you, as the CIO of Coca-Cola is able to provide to flock and the team about where you I've had this going, right. It's really on a very fast cadence. >>Absolutely. So as Coca-Cola TJ, we started the journey with two iPad, three years of work. Exactly. I was on the job and the second big technology decision I made was the iPad. And since then it was fear consistently think. But during our cab meeting, Daniel said something, he said, I'm not welcoming the request. He said, we welcome. He said, no, no, sorry. I am not welcoming. I'm requesting you to give us insight. And I think that's very critical. That's what we want to hear. At the end of the day, we are technologists. We are total leaders, but the are better taught leaders with our technology partners. So we want technology partners to show us the way sometimes. And with low code, no code type of approaches. And the evolution of the technology that UI path is, has been running since the past three years is helping us remove so many barriers. >>When it comes to people, they are listening to us in terms of the roadmap and what should be implemented and what should be prioritized VR, providing with them, our roadmap, our vision on where we want to go in automation and hugged battle. We want to integrate with other ecosystem and environments that we have. They are listening to us in terms of, for the existing products, what can be improved, what can work better? And we don't need a cab actually for you iPad to listen to us. We work hand in hand with two iPad team continuously be coil, you know, eight sometimes. So, and that's what we want them to continue to do. They are great technologists, as long as they continue to listen to us, they're going to be greater technology. >>Yeah. And I'll share my perspective on this, this, this, you know, these partnerships actually make us build better products, right? We get to, this is how we stay ahead of the curve by listening to our customers, because they're the ones who are doing the implementations. They understand how our product works. We can design it, we can test it. But that's the extent to which we can go once they implement it is when we know what's working, what's not working. And how do we take that feedback and make better products. So it's a two-way street. We love hearing from them constantly. >>You have to decode what the customer is saying sometimes, right? Like Steve jobs said, yeah, if you just ask the customer what they want, you'll never build, you know, something that's game changing the world changing. And so, so you have to talk to Layla, you get the input from COVID, Coca-Cola maybe many and then other customers to figure out, okay, how can I apply this? So that actually can scale and meet the needs of many customers. Not just so, because otherwise you end up being, you know, a custom development shop, which ironically is what you guys were 20 years ago. Right? So it's kind of some art involved in the science of listening. Isn't it? >>There is definitely, I mean, most of our job as product managers is to design the product, right? It's very much art and the feedback that we get from Layla and others, it really just helps us focus on a vision. But, you know, keeping up with new technology trends, figuring out how to figuring out how to, um, bring AI into our product vision and looking beyond what we're being told and asked for and looking forward at what the next trends are going to be in technology is what helps us continue to innovate. So it's both, it's the balance of what we're hearing, but also technologies. And what's possible with what's available >>Question for you. You said three years ago, you guys brought in UI path, right after you joined the company as it's CIO, why U I path, clearly you looked at some of the other folks, you mentioned that company that they acquired, but what in your mind differentiates what they're able to deliver on the partnership side and the technology side? >>Yeah. Very important question. We have a definition for a technology partner for us, the technology partner needs to meet criteria of innovating. So how much do you invest in innovation? And Daniel says, I don't even know the number, right? So because we want them to be on the forefront. Sometimes they have to pull us and sometimes we have to pull them. The second one is very important for a company to be successful in automation or in any advanced technology, you have to build intellectual property within your enterprise. And we did not want to art source technology. We wanted to insource technology and we asked you, I pad, if they would be reeling to co-innovate, co-develop collaborate with us. They were the only ones who allowed us to build the intellectual property within my enterprise, because that's the way I'm going to innovate. And that's the way I'm going to help product leaders like Pollock to create better products. Right? So, and the third one is just building expertise. Low-code no-code the technology company needs to, you know, wait where they remove some of the barriers for me to find the skills or develop talent, how easy it is to find the talent and skills to develop this technology. Right. And what, what does the technology company do to develop skills? So these are a few criteria that we have, and then when the company takes all of those, they are in, >>I'm interested in, um, to kind of shift the conversation. If I may, in your, your role, it's not uncommon to see a CIO and a chief digital officer together, but it's quite uncommon at a, at a large firm like Coca-Cola. And, and I'm wondering, is that how the company, cause your group sees information in digital? Is that how the company's organized? You know, that you plug into somebody who has that to a role. Can you talk about, >>Yeah, absolutely. So cocoli too. Jake is within the Coca-Cola system. We are one of the leading butlers within the Coca-Cola system. The reason I merged the two roles is to be successful in the digital era. When you have the digital and it separated. If it goes a little slower, you can not be successful in digital and you cannot be successful in generating new revenue streams or new business models. So you have to orchestrate that evolution and transformation of it and the rest of the business together. And that's why I merged the two roles. We are unique as Coca-Cola >>Merged them. You say you merged those roles, like, did you come at it from the, where you digital first and then CIO first >>Digital first. Okay. Great point. I built from scratch and started with the digital strategy. And then we went into defining what roles, what skills do we need? And then we redefined, what are the improvements we need on the it side? But it was all digital product based >>Because I think, uh, I think it would be much harder for a CIO, let alone a woman CIO, no offense, but I don't think there's any offense there, but oh, she's trying to do a land grab. I could see that happening, but the digital officer title, because that's the hot title and it's the visionary. Right. And it's a lot of times it's undefined. Yeah. So that's that and that, and that that's the structure of the organization. So you roll up into it. >>Uh, so yeah, because I came into the ex-con role. I had the privilege to kind of shape it from scratch. >>Exactly. And >>Like Shankar was talking about hidden brain and all the change this morning, it was a change in terms of how are we going to approach digital? It was a change in terms of all the people who are part of the company and people who have been in technology or it before right now, the expectations are very different. You have to be product organization, you have to be outcome centric. You have to generate the revenue streams. So it's very different from the world of it. I think any it or any technology leader can do this, if they are willing to transform themselves first and then their organization, and then they can transform the rest of the company, >>Chief digital officer data is a big part of your role. You're not the chief data officer, >>The organization, that's >>Part of your, okay, so the CDL reports into, okay, and that individual sure is responsible for governance and compliance. >>Well look, the data management, data governance, the foundation, and all the database solutions, I think >>You got it right. I think this idea of creating stovepipes, it just it's, it's not as productive and it's harder to make decisions that are aligned with the organization's goals, >>Boulder. So we're going to disrupt further. Our goal now is to create platforms and then democratize the platforms. So our operating partners can learn the new skills and they can develop their own use cases on the platforms. And that way they'll go much, further and much faster in terms of the generational new revenue, streams, changing, operating models, data and technology. I call it the new operating system of any business and everybody must learn >>Well. And that's what I want to ask you about, because if you think about, uh, uh, a company and incumbent, like Coca-Cola your processes over the years have in your data, maybe they were organized around the bottlers or the distribution channel, et cetera. And that might not be the best process. So you have to take a look at that and then use process mining to say, actually, what is the best process, reinvent yourself? Okay. >>Absolutely VRD and re-engineering and reinventing in a lot of places. Process mining helped us in short order to cash cycle. Everybody, every company has ordered to cash process. We took an order to cash process, which we recently standardized, by the way we thought we did. And every process mining told us that very few times you go through the happy path. Most of the times you go out of the happy path. So gave us a lot of tangible outcomes where we improve the cycle time. And it's an interesting process because you touch the customer it's impacts your delivery and your commitments to the customer. And it makes life easier for the employees. When you improve the process, this is only one piece VR also transforming the way we are interacting with our customers using digital means and digital channel. But one thing is very valuable with us while we do all of this staying hybrid is very important. Like with everything else, they do that human touch and personal relationship with our customers and consumers is invaluable. So we going to keep that doesn't matter how digital we go or how much technology we implement. They're going to keep the customer and consumer connect the most valuable asset that we have. >>Absolutely. It is. I'll go ahead. >>I was going to say, this is the one thing that, that we think about when we're designing our products, right? It's how can process my mining help you optimize your workflows, such that you can spend more time with the customer such that you can spend more time and get back to them faster. >>Yeah, that's critical. They, I always say the employee experience is inextricably linked to the customer experience. And so what you just talked about, you talked about so much stuff that I'd love to unpack. We probably don't have time, but coming in as with a transformation mindset, one being, you mentioned, you know, leaders need to be willing to embrace that. Obviously you were, but as a CIO, >>Working with UI path, you're really helping to redefine work. And also that customer experience, to an extent, how's your iPod helped facilitate that. So because they are listening and they are willing to partner with, and I think the most importantly, they're going to be part of our outcomes. They care about our outcomes. And going back to your question, how do we select a technology partner? That was one of the critical items. Outcomes are very critical. If there's no outcome, there's no point in it are not doing technology for the sake of doing it. We are, yes. We are all excited with what technology can bring and removing barriers very important, which is a huge, another huge topic. But if you don't generate an outcome it's meaningless and you AIPAC is willing to understand the outcome we are generating. So it's less of a commercial discussion, more of a technology and outcome conversation. >>So whether it's an customer outcome or an employee outcome or a cash outcome, financial outcome, I think that's why we have been successful. And they have been on the journey with you, iPad process mining. I think they are one of the very few clients, right? Customers of UI path who are using it. And because we are very progressive organization, you AIPAC is listening to our feedback and implementing back to your earlier question, you have so many customers who do you listen, right? So when you are progressive and when you really know what you are doing, you're also pulling your iPad, a big technology company into a direction that is more meaningful. So they listen to us in terms of what to improve with process mining. And that's why we were able to achieve the outcomes. And now they are listening to us further on further improvements on process mining so that we can capitalize on further outcomes and benefits of process mining >>In order to cash is common use cases. So what, what, uh, were there any diamonds in the rough, or do you suspect there are with, >>We already realized, yes. We realized multiple tangible outcomes. We discussed this with Polak earlier today. One of them is some very interesting, I'm not able to share, but the most critical one is be focused on improving cash cycle. It's scent. You can imagine extremely full flow business, even within FMCG, right? We as Coca-Cola system, we are an extremely flow business. It's an instant consumption business. Hence your delivery and cash cycles are very different compared to other industries. So we said, we want to improving cash. We discovered that the improved, the invoice due date change, which impacts the payment terms by 20%, we improved credit limits approvals by 5% by removing unnecessary approval steps. We realized there were unnecessary approvals. These two are directly impacting our customers as well because it's waiting in somebody's queue to handle those approvals. And the customer is not getting to delay delivery because it's payment, payment and delivery go hand in hand. >>And the third one is, and I'm not able to articulate it exact outcome, but it's a very critical day, every day gain on getting cash. So it's a cash game. The next big outcome is the cycle time improvements. So we significantly improve the cycle time of the process. And this means efficiency for our employees. We are making life easier for them. The last one is again, a tangible one 30,000 hours back in terms of productivity, one process, one country, 30,000 hours. And that translates into exactly that translates into benefit for the customer. You increase customer satisfaction, you increase employee satisfaction. 'cause you remove all the non-available for it. So going back to Pollock's point around continuous discovery, that's why we love it. It's like good old lean six Sigma lean six Sigma is exactly that you continuously, you want to continuously improve the process. You don't do it once with process mining. We don't want to do it once. We want to do it continuously, but this time with automation, >>But before we go, I'm the lone male on the panel. So I have to ask. So, so you CIO seat, chief digital role, very uncommon, let alone uncommon for a woman. Big time product management person. Okay. That's cool check. Right? You've been in the industry for a while now, a celebrity on the, on the cube and elsewhere. So has the pandemic, how has the pandemic affected the whole women in tech trend? Has it slowed it down? Has it accelerated? We were talking earlier about the working moms feeling like way stressed out more than the working dads, double 30% versus 15%. Has the pandemic in your minds altered in any way, was women in tech meme? How so positive. Negative. >>So we are trying to turn the negative into a positive. It is negative. Absolutely. I think it's impacted everybody, all, all women in all industries and in all areas of operation and workforce women in technology is already a very slim, right? It's a very tiny layer within any company and out there in the society. And unfortunately the challenges that came with COVID impacted and some of them had to leave and they couldn't stick around. Right. So we are trying to turn that into positive. As a digital function, we have a big give back initiative. It's a priority of the digital team. I'll be talking about that very in, in, and our technology removes barriers. So we have to turn this into a positive, yes, COVID has impacted everybody personally and directly or indirectly. But now with technology, we can remove barriers. We have now flexible working and hybrid working models, being ramped up across all geographies and all industries and all companies, technology removes barriers. >>We can teach technology to a lot of people and our communities and they can join because we have huge skill gaps in technology that would sat is we have huge scarcity of skills in technology. And we have very few people, but we are talking about women dropping out or any type of minor to dropping out, right? So we can leverage and improve and turn it around. I hope we'll accomplish to do that. We started doing that in our company and in Turkey. And we are trying to expand that across multiple other countries with NGO partnerships, helping women to gain certain skills so that they can join the economy again from wherever they are. >>And from my point of view, I think there are two aspects to it. As Layla said, it has affected women a little bit more, but I've also seen, in some cases it has leveled the playing field a little bit because there's, you know, everybody's on zoom. The kids show up on zoom cameras for men, just as much as they do for women. So it helps shine a light on things that we would normally go through that nobody would know about. And I thought that was a really cool outcome to some degree of this. You know, my manager prom has little kids and they'd be in his background all the time, just as my little kids would be by background. And I'm like, oh wow. So you know how it feels to be the caregiver at home. And I thought, I thought that was a positive outcome of the whole being a female in technology. I liked that >>That's something that I hadn't thought about in terms of leveling the playing field like that there's in this situation, there are both positives and negatives. I like how you're seeing the playing field level a bit more and how you're at. Coca-Cola looking to, how can we turn this negative into a positive lots of opportunities there we uncovered a lot in the last, I'm going to guess 20 minutes talking about continuous process discovery, all the way to women in technology, how you're each doing that and what your perspectives are. I wish we had more time. We could keep going, but ladies, thank you for joining David. >>It's been a pleasure >>For Dave Volante. I'm Lisa Martin live in Las Vegas at the Bellagio UI path forward for it. We'll be right back.

>>Live from Las Vegas. It's the cube covering UI path forward Americas 2019. Brought to you by UI path. Hello everyone and welcome >>do the cubes live coverage of UI path forward. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight, co-hosting alongside of Dave Volante. We are joined by Layla Delage. She is the chief information and digital officer at Coca-Cola. ECEK thanks so much for coming on the show. Thank you. Great to be here. Very exciting. And also Christina Perala, she is the group RPA lead at Generali. Thank you so much for coming into, for inviting me. Thank you. So I want to hear from you both about what, what your industry is and what your role is. Level. Let's start with you. Okay, great. Um, so we are, um, one of the Rogers bottlers within the Coca-Cola system. Uh, we produce, distribute and sell Coca Cola company products. The operating around 10 countries are middle East and central Asia and parts of middle East, Pakistan, Syria and Turkey. They are actually born out of Turkey and that's where our central offices, um, we've operate with 26 plants, around 8,500 employees. >>Uh, we serve a consumer base of 400 million and we have around close to 1 billion, uh, customers. Uh, and we continue to invest in the countries where we operate. And my role is to film and my role is all things digital within this community. So leading technologists, leading technology, all things digital. Yes. So Christina, tell us about Generali. Generalia. Sikora Zuni is a leading insurance company as the presidency. Enough 50 countries worldwide and more than a 70,000 employees that were wider. So it's a bigger company, not only for insurance. And my role with the internet rally group is to leader the LPA program. So I'm inside of the group that I in digital. So am I inside this group, I'm very focused on smart process automation. So RPA plus AI, because a has a, we already know all I loudly, LPA without a AI is announcer nowadays. So we have to keep on talking about AI, machine learning algorithms to enrich, uh, uh, the capabilities of basic robotic sell, hand reach, also the Antwerp and automation of processes. You're the CIO and the CDO. Yes. Yes. That's unique. First of all, there's one that's unique too. It's even more unique than a woman has both roles. So what's the reason behind it? So, um, there's definitely a reason behind it. I joined the Coca Cola >>system about a year ago, so I'm just a over a year in the company. The reason actually I wanted to make sure that we highlight the CIO and CTO CDO role together is, um, I want to advocate for all the it organizations to transform and really get into the digital world and get into the world of advanced technologies, become strategic business partners. Get out of the kitchen, I call it kitchen kitchen, it, you know, get out of the managing of data centers or cloud and um, just the core foundational systems and applications. Get into the advanced technology, understand the business, gain business acumen and deliver solutions based on business needs. So to highlight that, I want to make sure that I hold the role of both and I'm able to be advocate of both worlds. Cause digital without it support is not able to accomplish what they need to accomplish and it needs to get into more of the digital space. And Christina, as the RPA, you write bots, you evangelize the organization. >>Um, mostly the second. So in generally we have a, a very, uh, so, uh, sort of ivory the organization. So for something we are very decentralized, for example, for the developing of robots or the deploying for the action, the operational stuff and so on. Uh, but uh, for some stuff like a guidelines, uh, uh, risk framework to ensure that robots can do their work in the right way with notice to all for the business processes, uh, for this stuff before guidelines, framework, best practice sharing. We are a central centralized, we, we try to be centralized. So, uh, my role is to try to collect is to collect and not try and super lat, uh, best practices and share with you in the companies chair, uh, um, the best use cases. And, uh, also tried to gather what are the main concerns, what are the difficulties in order to a facilitator and to boost smarter process automation of the option. So >>Laila, you are up on the main stage this morning. You, I Pat highlighted Coca Cola itchy as a, as a customer that is embraced automation, embrace the UI pass solution. So tell us a little bit about the challenges you are facing and then why you chose I a UI path. So as I joined the company, uh, I introduced a very strong digital strategy that required a lot of change and it's within a company that has been very successfully operating all these years and doing pretty much know what to do very well. And all of a sudden with digital we are starting to disrupt the, are trying to say, Hey, we've got to change the way, do some of the things. Um, so belief in digital and belief that it can really bring efficiency and outcomes was very important. And I needed a quick win. I needed to have a technology or a solution or an outcome that I would generate very quickly and show to the whole organization that this can be done and we can do this as Coca-Cola. TJ. >>So that was, that was RPA, that was our PA for this fascinates me because you're an incumbent business, been around for a long time. you're a bottler and distributor, right? So yeah, processes are around the bottling plants and the distribution system. Yes. And now you're transforming into a digital business. Yes. I'll put data at your core. Totally not start his daytime customer. Okay. So describe the difference between the traditional business and what it looks like when you've transformed, particularly from a data perspective. And then I want to understand what role RPA plays. So we are definitely a very data rich company, however, to call ourselves data rich and to call it a strategic asset, I first need to capture and control my data and I have to treat it like a strategic asset. So that is a huge transformation. The second, once you treat it as an asset, how do you generate more insights? >>And I call this augmenting the gut feeling. I have an amazing gut feeling in the company. How do I augment that with data and provide our, this is partners and then our customers and our suppliers and some of the information. And then obviously future maturity level is, you know, shared economy and data monetization, et cetera. So that's how I describe within the company. And then assets, other assets like our plants and coolers cooler, we call it cooler, you know, where do you actually see all our products? They are called, they are visible and they are available, but they are also in that set where I can turn them into a digital cooler and I can do so much more with the cooler that standing. And I recently, in one of our leadership meetings I said we have as many coolers as the um, population on the fishy Island, which is close to 1 million. >>So just imagine in this new world, in this digital era, everything that you can do by just having a cooler, 1 million coolers present out there on the street, I can serve the consumers, I can serve customers with very different information. So that's kind of what I mean by turning the business into a digital business. So that's an awesome story. By the way, how does RPA fit into that vision? RPA is everywhere in division. So I said when I started the journey, uh, any digital journey has some Muslim battles for me. There are four must win battles. I need to get certain things right in it, in the, and that was one, one of the Mustin battles was alteration. So we have to create efficiency, we have to optimize, we have to streamline. And we said automation first. Um, and we started with, I call it robotics and automation. >>And I agree with what you said, Christina. It's more than just robots. It's actually a strategic application. It could be a good old ERP. It's the RPA, it's AI, it's all the other technologies that are out there that they bring the two of them brings. So how do you create this end to end solution using all the trends, technologies to create optimization? Uh, our goal was how do we get back to our customer much faster. We had so many customer facing processes and they're going to be there forever. They are a very customer centric customer into company obviously. So how do I get back to my customer faster? How do I make my employees just happy? They were working on so many things would be until midnight over time during weekends. How do I take that away from them? So we called it lifting the weight of the shoulders and giving you a new capabilities. So again, augmentation and then giving them that space. So we had uh, three of my employees upskilled and reskilled themselves. They became a developers in the robotics space, a couple of fire functional, um, colleagues are now reskilling themselves because now they have the time to reskill. More importantly, they have the time to actually leverage their expertise and they are so much more motivated. The engagement, the employee engagement is increasing. So that's how we are positioning RPA. Pristina ICU >>nodding a lot, your head too. A lot of what Layla is saying. I'm wondering if you can talk to about any best practices that have emerged as you've implemented RPA at Generali to what you've learned. Yes, for sure. Um, we have a lot of processes automated, uh, all around the group. Uh, but we are not, we have not reached our maximum or, uh, benefits, uh, gaining. So what we need to do right now is to try to boost the smart process automation, uh, via analyzing the issue around value, Cena. So each business area of the value chain because currently we have countries that has, that have a different level of maturity. So, so some countries are at the very beginning and we have to help them with best practice sharings with a huge case, successful use cases. And we are, uh, we have a lot of help from parts into, in this because locally and who I Potter as a, a very strong presence and is very powerful in doing that. >>And, uh, now, uh, our next mouth are very focused on try to, um, uh, deep dive, the vertical, our area of the issue around value chain and identify which are the processes inside them are best to automated. Uh, uh, Basinger. Uh, these activities are not so you, I part, we'd, his experience has created a heat mapper, value chain Heath mapper. And so it's given up as some advice where to focus our strengths, our hand energy in automating. And I think that this is a very huge, uh, uh, support that you are UI parties given us. So it's not just a matter of, okay, let's start, uh, uh, do some, uh, process assessment in order to identify which processes are the best candidates to be automated. But, uh, we have, uh, how our back, uh, us. So we, we are, uh, we have the backing of UI pass saying it's better to do that and automate in depth, uh, processes of that, but Oh, the value chain. So we are starting a program to do that with all the countries or the vertical area of the country. So, and I think that this could really bring a, uh, high benefits and can, uh, uh, drive us to, uh, really having a scaling up in using a smart process, automation and UI. But you a bot ecosystem not only are, so >>one of the nice things about RPA is you can take the software robots and apply them to an existing process. A lot of times changing processes and a lot of times almost always changing processes is painful. However, we've talked to some customers that have said by applying RPA to our business, it's exposed some really bad processes. Have you experienced that and can you maybe share that experience with it? Absolutely. So for us, one of the initial, um, robots, we applied to a customer facing process. It was our field team trying to get back to our customer with a, with some information. And we realize that the, um, the cycle time was very long. And the reason is there are four functions involved in answering the question and seven different applications are being touched all the way from XL to ERP to CRM. So what we did obviously bringing a strategic solution to fix the cycle time and reduce that to streamline the process was going to take us long. So RPA was great help. We reduced the cycle time by putting a robot and we were able to get back to ours, priests, sales team in the field in matter of minutes. What used to take hours was now being responded to in minutes. Now that doesn't mean that process is perfect, but that's our next step. So we created value for our customer and our sales team within the field, um, before, you know, streamlining and going into a bigger initiatives. So then you could share Christina. >>Yes. Uh, so, um, it is necessary to automate something that could be automated. So, uh, it is necessarily to out optimize the process before automating it, but sometimes it's better to automate it as Caesar because, uh, also the not optimize the process can bring value if ultimated. So let me share an example. If you, for example, have to migrate some data obviously is a one shot, uh, uh, activity. But with the robot you can do it in a very short, well sharp timer. Maybe it's not the best, uh, process to be automated, but that could be useful as well. So it's always a matter of understanding the costs and the benefits. Uh, and sometimes, uh, FBA is very quickly, is very quick to be implemented and can be, can have a, also a lot of savings instead of integrating instead of doing more complex things. >>And then other things, uh, that it's important to take into account is that, uh, uh, after having a automating goal, all the low hanging fruits and so the processes with a low cost, uh, uh, low complexity and high benefits, uh, then it starts to facer when it's necessary to understand how to the end to end processes. Because, uh, it happens, uh, in, uh, some of our countries that, uh, the second phase is very difficult because, uh, the situation is that you have very, um, a lot of very fermented processes. And so before automating it is necessary to apply operational efficiency methodology, lean six Sigma, rare business process for engineering and then automate it. So it's a longer trip. And our Amer as group head office in general is to give these kinds of methodologies and best practices for all kinds of level of maturity in our countries. So finally, w what is the customer is the employee response then in terms of how you're talking a lot about streamlining, getting rid of these tedious tasks that took forever, how, how our employees reacting to the implementation. >>So we, um, we actually launched the, uh, announce announced RPA robotics and automation with a Hekaton in our company. And we invited 40 colleagues from various functions and two and everybody from the business was there and they participated actually in gathering ideas and prioritizing what matters most to the company. And we looked at customer, we looked at compliance, we look to the employee and we actually with during the hackathon you iPad team helped us to go live with one of the robots. They were mesmerized. They couldn't believe that this could happen. I think that's where we kind of engaged them and now going forward everyone who generate the idea was part of the building of the robots so they continue to be engaged to me allowed them to name the robots so they start naming and once the robots were alive yet literally had some of our teams who are dancing from happiness and I think that said it all. That was the strongest voice of our business partner and we published that video. So our business partners became our advocates and that's really our how we born the robotic and automation within CCI. We have so many advocates right now they are coming to us. Our business partners are coming to us with more use cases and they are actually, they are sharing with rest of the system within Coca-Cola and with the group that we are part of locally in Turkey, they are sharing their stories. So now we have a hype going on in the system. >>Yes. And in generally, um, at the beginning, uh, we face some fears in our employees fears of losing their job, but fear is not be able to use this kind of technology. Uh, but, uh, also with the help of HR because I, Charlie is, uh, driving a huge program of upskilling and reskilling of people. Uh, nowadays, uh, also hand user are very happy to use robotics, uh, because, uh, uh, when they realize that they can really help in their activities, in their very boring and not useful activities, they are very happy to enjoy this, this program. But it is so, uh, it, it was a trip, a journey with the employees to make them understand that it's not something that, uh, is affecting their job. So, at least in generally group, we are, we are programming, uh, these, uh, uh, or employees, uh, journey in order to make them, uh, uh, to have more, uh, uh, awareness about robotics and not be scared about it. Layla and Christina, thank you both so much for coming on the cube. It was wonderful. Thank you very much for you. I'm Rebecca Knight for Dave Volante. Please stay tuned for more of the cubes live coverage of UI path forward.

>> live from Las Vegas. It's the Cube covering magenta. Imagine twenty nineteen. Brought to you by Adobe. >> Hey, welcome back to the Cube. Lisa Martin at Imagine, twenty nineteen from the Wynn Las Vegas. It's happy hour here, but I really wish I had a Coke. I don't have one. But I do have a gentleman from Coca Cola, please doing me and welcoming a couple of guests to the Cube. We have Enrique no great day. The director of Direct to Consumer for Coca Cola Mexico. Enrique, Thank you for joining us. >> Thanks, Lisa. Nice to meet you. >> And we have from forty for Raghu Kerala managing partner. Welcome to >> the Cube. You nailed the name. There you go. Talk >> to >> that interview. I did my best. All right, so here we are in imagine, twenty nineteen with about thirty, five hundred or so people. This show is one that has a tremendous amount of energy. It's like you gave everybody a cook when they walked in the door. Didn't really need it, But we've heard a tremendous amount of positivity people very excited for being able to leverage the power of data to deliver really impactful experiences and as consumers of any product. We want a brand to know us. We want them to help us make our lives better. Before we dig into that with Coca Cola, argue, let's start with you. Forty four is one of magenta owes partners. Give us a little bit of a history there on what you guys do, together with the Gento and four customers like Coca Cola, Mexico. >> Thank you, Lisa, and thank you for inviting us here today. Well, when we put together forty four, we ask yourself some questions like, How do we aspire to be great? And one of the things was to surround ourselves with great partners and adobes definitely been a great partner for us, because what we want to do is bring tea to our customers. A not just a sight but an experience for their consumers. They can live on and grow and invest in a platform. And what we found with Adobe and the Magenta Commerce cloud was a way that we could start building something in an array, tours greatness by using data and insights to build upon our knowledge. And luckily, way found a great partner in Coca Cola that we could aspire to be great together to the end. Consumer e commerce is still in this early days, and what we wanted to say is that a great brand could start and start looking at e commerce in a way to improve their customers. Lives be available in moments that of need and moments of want. And that's something we started doing with North America about four years ago and brought that to Western Europe. And now Lat Ham in the last year has been a great experience partnering with you. >> CocaCola is a brand that everybody knows globally. It's one of those almost feel good brands, right? I mean, you just can't help but get a smile on your face when somebody asked If you want a cup full, of course, who would say no to that? Give me a little lemon twist and I'm very happy, but something that you guys are doing together with Coca Cola. Mexico was really inspirational, and it's really helping to transform and improve people's lives. And we could talk to us about the program that you're building with forty four and how it's actually making giving people access to things that they don't just want that they actually need, like, quality of life, type of sure products. >> So thanks. Thanks a lot, Lisa, for the invitations. So first of all, you know, we have a big challenge, because way No, we have a great brand way, actually have a lot of brands, and that's the challenge. So how can we create this? The solution where we can access people to this? Never. It's for life. So it's not only Coke way have a lot of different products, and Wei have in Mexico is that it's, ah, project that we are calling Coca Cola. It's Coke at home on what we do there is. We are providing the consumers a subscription model where we are enabling the access to multiple beverage products any time on everywhere. So that's that's That's the ambition we have we launched last year in the city of Monterrey. It's It's our first city. We are planning to scale this business into the whole country and probably Latin America. First on, why not probably the states on some foreseeable future. >> So this is more than on demand. I live in Silicon Valley, where we're pretty, you know, we have high expectations and I want to order something, whether it's on door dash or through Google expressed our Amazon that I wanted to show up within an hour. But that's, you know, I might be lazy, that I don't actually want to get in my car and driver walk somewhere. But what you're talking about this is this is not just I want Coca Cola products on demand. This is actually reaching people that really have a strong and need for this type of service. Talk to us about that human interaction and what you guys are really enabling there for your consumers. >> Sure, so So, yeah, United. So the thing is, what we see, the big opportunity here is way. Want to be closer to our consumers? We went to understand them. We want to to hear from them, to receive feedback directly back the way we are used to working Coca Cola in the past one hundred and thirty three years that that's a history of cardiac alights way have the customers that interact with consumers, and then we get some information from the consumers. We've been great doing marketing campaigns, you know. But right now the challenge that we're facing is we want to have direct feedback from them. So we're creating this eco system where we are getting feedback. We're getting knowledge from them, and we know exactly what what's their their needs. The pain points, their suffering, Andi the way what we can solve them and probably eventually some future products. But we can create for them with the specific necessities that they have. So that's what we're creating there. That's a big thing. >> And so we're gonna talk to us about the opportunity to work with a brand like Coca Cola that's been around for over one hundred thirty years, talk about transformation and be able to enable them to really kind of not just delight customers. But there's an emotional connection that people >> have this products. So we always say, like ideally done way can add value from the state of desire to the state of consumption, and in between is a transaction. It's fulfillment, its operations and perhaps unique to most clients of, um, Magenta and Adobe. Coca Cola in Mexico owns a full relationship, and it's a full branded piece from creating that desire in your heart in your mind in your taste buds, but then owning that all the way through the delivery trucks and the people delivering it to your door. And that's something that a CPD firm just actually, I'm not sure of any other CPV firm does in the US or in Mexico at this point. And but then what is the excellence mean? We haven't untidy of excellence of what Coke means to us, the nostalgia and what it means today. But that also raises the high bar because we're not allowed to not be excellent at any other touch point of the brand. But definitely it's fun, right? It's a challenge, you know, making money online. That's the easy part, Being really proud of what you're doing online. That's kind of what makes you go to work every day. >> Being relevant for consumers is what, yeah, >> being relevant? Absolutely, especially because there's a lot of choice with most products and services that are available to us as consumers these days. And if you think of you know, we've been talking a lot at this event about the customer experience and customer experience management, and how can Adobe Inn Magenta enable their customers to use data to understand what delivering what my customer wants to improve. Whether it's, you know, we talked to HP Inc this morning allowing me to order a new PC or printed or ink and have it delivered specifically exactly the way that I wanted to. Whether it's, you know, getting a Coca Cola. I want whoever I'm interacting with to give you a seamless experience. But use the data that you're collecting about me to make my life better. Make my life easier, more seamless. Frictionless. How are you guys at forty for helping Enrique and team utilize that data too crude to really enhance this consumer experience and maybe even create more brand loyalty? Yeah, it's >> interesting. I think data is a tool, but then your hypothesis, where you go from has to be endemic to the brand and for Coca Cola. On the internal, we think of it as a portfolio portfolio of different products in different needs states from hydration to enjoyment from special moments to everyday moments. But then that allows you to start thinking, How do I be part relevant part of more moments and then you could say, Where does data fit into that and now I can understand how there's a new moments being made because people's lives change and the youth always find different ways in different ways of living in different way from being. How can we be relevant to them through our throughout all of that, from the moment you wake up in what you need state is there to special moment of happiness, and they have a company that has products that could live up to. All of that is great and you know you need a portfolio. But you also need to being desire and wanted need all together in one thing, because one person has all of that and one company came, fulfill it if you think about it from a idea of moment. But then what data? Khun, Due to bring those to life >> so soon being relevant, continuing to be relevant is challenging. It's going to require you to really look at trends across a spectrum of, say, consumer behaviors. Enrique, what are some of the trends that you guys are seeing with this project that you've launched in Mexico, and how were you going to be using those trends to expand this globally? >> Sure, Yeah, So? So first of all, as you, as you know, probably e commerce in Mexico is is quite a small right now. So the thing is, it's growing in, you know, very aggressive rates on DH. It happens the same in the rest of Latin America countries. So what What other retailers are looking at is they want to create this this big business right now because they know that in the future it's going to be the competitive advantage for them. So So I think that's something that not many sippy jeez are looking at. There's a lot off are things that must happen inside the companies to enable this on DH. In my experience, the most challenging things and it's not a trend, but it's it's a challenge that we face us as a big city. Gee, Cos is how can we change the culture inside the company? Because this is the main barrier we have. We face when we see and I I'm going to give you the example of Mexico when we see the digital sales of the beverage in Mexico, it comes about two point five percent of the total sales that we have so its its really small if you compare it to the rest of the retail. So whenever we go to the to the rest of the corporation and the rest of the building in Mexico, we say that we want in best, and we want to do there's there's a lot of barriers, you know on the challenge, the main challenge that we face right now. The's companies that want to go direct ical Sumer is this is happen. We changed the mindset, change the culture, and I think that's the most relevant. It's no trend, but it's It's the most relevant challenge that we're facing right now, >> a big challenge because not just for for every convict, but a company with the history that Coca Cola has to be able to start leveraging that data to start to change mindsets and ship cultures. Where are you guys on that journey? And how is your partnership with forty four may be a facilitator of that cultural change? >> Yeah, sure, So it's to be really honest. We're we're beginning this journey way have some countries that are ahead of us. We have some examples in China, For example, curriculum, China's great things cortical in North America is doing very big things in Mexico and Latin America. We're starting the journey on the thing. What we realized is that we need to get together with people that know of this matter. Way are really good at marketing. We're really good at a commercial approach. Operational approach ware not the best at the commerce, but we. That's why we are partnering with guys that no one, we're partnering with platforms like Adobe Magenta, too. To achieve this, that's that's the thing, right? >> Yeah, >> Rookie will finish with you. What are some of the things that you have seen and heard at? Imagine twenty nineteen from a technology innovation perspective that give you the confidence that adobe in Magenta Technologies are going to be able to deliver, what it is that Enrique and his team need to make that barrier change internal evaporate. Yeah, >> I mean, I think when you think of technology right now, even within adobes, it's what the combination of different products that adobe has and how they're going to come together. So the roadmap is a critical piece of it. I think there's been a great announcement of Sensei's coming in and being part of the core offering to make each interaction a little smarter, but also really see the payoff and save what's the real need that trying to be solved, then back that into the products that you see to cut between the different between a press release and a road map? And I think when you come to a summit like this, you hear things from Adobe. But then you also hear the reactions from the customers. And if you hear those both at the same time, you find that great thing in the middle >> of >> what's actionable. And I think if you think of only customer opinions or the what the platform says individually, I think they're less relevant than finding that really time reaction to trends and say, Honestly, sometimes you're drowning in technology and you wantto move the business forward and react to that weak sales that month's numbers. But then you say, Well, let me take a step back and look at the road map or vice versa, and I think everybody's in different stages of where they're going. So until you get that wisdom from everybody else, anyone announcement might be might take you off course. But then you start saying other people are in my boat. Other people are filling my opportunity, sent my sense of opportunity, and other people are feeling my sense of pain. And it's great to see a community come together. It's five thousand people that all want to accomplish something different things, but they want to accomplish success. Whatever. However, they personally define it. >> And it is to your point. It's a very, very strong community here. But we thank you both so much for taking the time to share with us what you guys are doing together with Coca Cola run that everybody knows and loves. So I say we go get a cookie cola and wrap this segment. What do you think you're all right? >> Moment is coming. >> Fantastic. You're watching the Cube. I'm Lisa Martin from Imagine, twenty nineteen from the Wynn Las Vegas. Thanks for watching

>> Announcer: Live from the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas, it's theCUBE, covering Magento Imagine 2018. Brought to you by Magento. >> Hey, welcome back to theCUBE, I'm Lisa Martin, live at the Wynn, Las Vegas at Magento Imagine 2018. We've had a really cool day here talking about lots of facets of commerce, e-commerce, and really talking about commerce as a center of gravity around digital transformation. If you drink Coke like I do, you're going to be pretty excited to hear our next guest. We've got Todd Skidmore, the manager of eCommerce from Coca-Cola. Todd, thanks so much for joining us. >> Thanks for having me. >> So I'm super thirsty now, there's probably some Coke bottles behind us. >> (laughs) Yeah, exactly. >> So everybody knows the iconic Coca-Cola brand and the Share A Coke branding that you guys have been using a long time. As retail, and really as consumers, as we've really started to change the way, not just that we buy, but the experience that we want to have, I'd love to hear the journey that you guys are on at Coca-Cola to make a product that's been around for how long, really personal. So talk to us about what the Share A Coke journey is, and let's start with why you even started it. >> Perfect. Yeah, so the campaign actually started really as an opportunity to connect with consumers in a more personal way, and it was an in-store campaign. It started in Australia, actually, in 2011, and was hugely successful, so it moved its way across the world and made it to the U.S. in 2014 and of course, you can imagine the U.S. as big as it is, and we have the distribution, and complexities, and manufacturing, took a few years to bring it, but it was hugely successful in 2014, but of course, success breeds opportunities, and with that, people started going, "Well, I can't find my name on a bottle "in the store, how can I get my name?" Posting on social media, et cetera, which is great exposure, but we had an opportunity, so when we brought the program back for the next summer, the campaign in-store as well, we also brought in our first foray into direct-to-consumer e-commerce where you are able to go onto the site, personalize a bottle yourself, and get any name on a bottle. You weren't restricted to what was in the store, or even if it was in the store and you couldn't find it, now you had an opportunity to bring that to life. So that's kind of been the journey, and that was three years ago when we launched the site, and now we've gone from just basically selling one skew, which was a Coke bottle, infinitely customizable one skew, but one skew, to now we have over 6,000 skews on the site, including licensed merchandise, lots of different bottle options, all kinds of stuff, so. Really, the whole thing has been about connecting with consumers, listening to what consumers want, and then bringing those experiences and the brand in a really special and unique way. >> I love that you're listening and taking that consumer feedback and identifying by doing so, I imagine, using big data and analytics, to then identify additional business models and revenue streams for Coca-Cola. >> Yeah, so, the crazy thing is we started it and the big thing was you can get your name on a bottle. Well, then we started realizing by looking at the data that people were using it for weddings, and events, and all kinds of things, and reunions, and graduation parties, and so being able to customize it and have it for an event like that brings really a special, you know, the Coca-Cola to those occasions, which is exactly what we want as a company, is to be a part of the communing and occasions like that, so being able to use that data to drive our products and also drive our marketing. So now we don't just talk about getting your name on a bottle, we talk about these occasions and marketing. We have a whole wedding page, talking about weddings, et cetera, so. >> Wow! That's cool. So you guys are a award finalist here at Magento Imagine 2018 for the Imagine Excellence Awards in the Customer Insights category, and it's kind of (mumbles) with what you were just saying in terms of listening to customers, but also from a data-driven standpoint, you mentioned marketing, and I'm a marketer, and marketing is now a science because there is so much data available, but as consumers we want that. We want an experience, whether its Coca-Cola or some other retailer, we want them to know enough about us, to not steal our data, but to be able to deliver a seamless experience regardless of channel, that's relevant to me as a person, as a human. And that's something that you guys will find out, I guess tonight at the awards ceremony. >> Yeah we'll see what happens tonight, but yeah. So we definitely try to use as much data as we can to inform where we're going to take the next program, marketing campaign, et cetera. So it's listening to what people are buying or even saying in the reviews, et cetera, so. >> So in terms of the genesis done in Australia, and then brought it to the states as an in-store program seasonal, a few years ago you've launched the online direct-to-consumer, I imagine, mobile, tablet, any way that they want to consume it. >> Yep. >> Talk to us about opening up this channel, direct-to-consumer and what that is helping achieve from a business perspective. >> Well, I think it's another way to sort of certainly learn more about what our consumer wants, and we certainly get probably the best data that you can get on an eCommerce site than you get even compared to almost any other type of platform or way we've had in the past. We've had rewards programs in the past which was also another way to get great consumer data, but this is one where you absolutely know if someone makes a purchase they're making an investment in your brand, which means you know that's a valuable customer, and that's a valuable consumer that you can then understand that's the type of people that we want to be associated with, market to, and have them be a part and connected to our brand. >> So the responsiveness to your consumers is quite clear. If we take a look at, you said 6,000 skews now? >> Todd: Yeah. >> So it's expanded beyond the actual Coca-Cola bottle. So many different opportunities. How are you using technology to help manage and track all these different skews and ensure that supply and demand is in sync. >> So, we do the best that we can while-- we are, I will be honest with you, we're a pretty scrappy bunch within Coca-Cola, and we have an analytics team, or person I should say, a 'team', person, and we rely on that to pull that data down and analyze it and take a look at what's happening. We're of course reviewing that and reacting to it as quickly as can. I talked about an example in my speaking session earlier today where, at Coachella, TeenVogue picked up one of our outfits and took a picture of a model there. It started trending on Instagram, and it was only offered in-store, in our brick and mortar stores. We were able to get it up online within 24 hours so we could start reacting, so of course that just happened days ago. >> Right. >> So, we're really trying to be progressive and fast and agile about reacting to what consumers are interested, because they were on Instagram going, "Hey, where can I buy this?" et cetera, and so being able to sort of react and do those things is exciting. >> Absolutely. One of the things that I find interesting, and we've talked a lot about this today with out guests, is the conveniences that we expect as consumers, right? We want to be able to go to any device wherever we are and buy whatever we want, and expect that it's going to show up in a little brown box on the doorstep two days later. How are you seeing trends in the consumer space spill into the corporate space? >> Maybe reword that again so I... >> So you're selling to consumers, and you're doing a lot of pivoting, "Hey, they want this, they want that." >> Todd: Oh, okay, so like corporate orders? >> Exactly, exactly. >> Yeah, I mean, I think really we all know that the whole business world and everybody's lives are coming together. It used to be traditional, it was like work was my work and personal was my personal. That's not the case anymore, and also with e-commerce sites, b to b sites now are becoming more like d to c sites. People are expecting much more of it, expectations are much higher from what you're going to deliver on a b to b site. So I think all these worlds are sort of merging, and I think from a corporate perspective, they see an opportunity with a Coca-Cola brand, and we want to be able to deliver that on the corporate side as well, so. >> So is that business growing then, in terms of companies coming to the website to, like you see with, you said weddings and other occasions, is corporate buyers now kind of at that level? >> Yeah, so we even have hotels buying for events on our site now, so we have some relationships there that we've tapped in to, which is the great thing about Coca-Cola is we have all these partnerships with properties, entertainment, et cetera, and we try and bring all those things. That's been a big focus of mine, is taking advantage of the things that Coke already has in place, and bringing them to a new way, and a new way to sort of participate in those partnerships via the bottles basically. >> So the website is by... >> Well, you can go to cokestore.com, that's the easiest way, or shareacoke.com. The reason we've sort of moved to the cokestore.com, think about it, it was kind of a program to begin with, now Share A Coke is just a piece of sort of an overall direct-to-consumer offering that we have. >> So, exciting opportunity tonight with being a finalist with this award, what are some of the things that you're looking forward to as 2018 continues in terms of, maybe some of the next iterations of products or opportunities based on what you're hearing from your consumers? >> Yeah, I think the next year or so is really going to be interesting and where we go in terms of direct-to-consumer and what things we can push into further, I mean we know we've got a really good, solid, we know that we need to to be able to offer something that is special and unique so we will continue to follow that path of, we're not going to try and compete in selling something that you can get everywhere else. It just doesn't make sense. But we want to be able to offer things that we can truly offer that are unique from what you can get elsewhere. >> And continue that personalization, and relationship. >> Yeah, that'll be driving our roadmap forward will we always be unique, special, personal, exactly. >> Awesome, well Todd, thanks so much for stopping by and sharing about Share A Coke. >> Yeah. >> Now I know where to go to order a bottle since you didn't bring me bottles that say Lisa on them. >> I should've brought you a bottle, yes. >> That's okay, next time. >> Yeah, alright, perfect, thanks. >> Thanks so much again for your insight, really interesting conversation. >> Alright, thanks for having me. >> We want to thank you for watching theCUBE. I'm Lisa Martin, live at Magento Imagine 2018. I'm going to go get myself a Coke. I'll be right back with my next guest, see you then.

>> From Orlando, Florida, it's theCUBE! Covering SAP SAPPHIRE NOW 2018. Brought to you by NetApp. >> Welcome to the CUBE we are in Orlando, at SAP SAPPHIRE 2018, I'm Lisa Martin with Keith Townsend as my co-host. We're in the NetApp booth, and we are very excited to talk to the VP of the Chief Customer Office at SAP, Mark Marcus, Mark, welcome to theCUBE. >> Thank you, glad to be here I appreciate it. >> This event is enormous. One of the things that really struck me in Bill McDermott's key note was, you know, we always here about, oh we are expecting 20 thousand people, he talked about a million people engaging with SAP SAPPHIRE this week, via the in person, and the live, and the on demand video experiences. Massive! 390 thousand customers, hundreds of customer sessions the voice of the customer validating SAP as one of the world's most valuable brands is not only pervasive here its palpable. So talk to us about the Chief Customer Office. What is it, what's it's mission, why was it created? >> Yes, okay that's a great, a great way, so first of all thank you, I appreciate you being here, I live in Orlando so it's great to see this event in my-- People wonder why SAPPHIRE is actually in Orlando, it's because I live here. (all laughing) >> You're the reason! >> You're the reason. >> I'm the reason SAPPHIRE is in Orlando, Florida. >> Okay, you heard it, Mark Marcus, you're the reason. >> No, so what happened is, when Bill McDermott came to SAP, he was a different type of leader, and what he wanted to do immediately is start meeting with customers. So what he did is, he started meeting with customers, and he said if you have any questions or problems, give me a call. And so what happened is, his phone started ringing, people needed help, so he needed somebody that could help him with the customers when he ran North America. And so that was the genesis to Chief Customer Office. So we started off, first, we were extremely reactive. And so what I mean by that is, if the customer had a problem, we'd have to go in, and we'd have to help them. And it's much more difficult when you have a problem, then try to prevent a problem. So what we've been doin' the last several years, is trying to be much more proactive, so instead of waiting for the phone to ring, we've been getting with customers, and making sure, you know, as their project start, begin their steering committee meetings and make sure that things go well. >> So, you've taken that more proactive approach, it's almost how the organization's evolved. What is the focus today? >> Yes, well the focus has always been the customer, but I think it's more of, taking the best practices that we've learned, and actually sharing those with the customers, and helping them explain how other people have done their journey, because what you'll find, is people are in different phases of their journey, and what they like to hear more of is, you know, what did other customers do, what did they do right, what did they do wrong, and how can we be more successful? So we've been able to, over the years, if you think about, just to put it in perspective again, there are, SAP North America has 158 thousand customers, and we're only on, my particular team only has about a hundred of those customers, that we have. So it's a very, very small amount, they're are ones that, you know, are strategic to SAP, that we get involved in. But what we're able to do though, is, through social media and other areas is, customers wanna hear what happened, again, in the past, and how we can, you know, learn from that and move forward. >> So, I'm a big social media fan. Twitter handle has 38 thousand followers, which a lot for your focus on a hundred customers, so I think that, that you're echoing the, the theme very well. Talk to us about how it's changed over the past, 14 or so years, shift has focused from on-premises solutions to hybrid-cloud, to cloud analytics, AI, what's the, what are customers talking about? >> I'll tell you what, you're talkin' my language now, (Keith laughing) okay, because what happened is what we did is, actually what I'm in part, what I'm a part of is actually the cloud ambassador program. And so what that is, is it's focusing on our cloud customers so, you know, success factors, Ariba, Concur, and those kinda things, and so, really what happened, is, you know, when SAP, when I came to SAP 14 years ago, it was all on-premise ERP, alright? So it's very contained, very controlled with what people had now there's Cloud's, we're not really sure what customers are doing, how they're interacting with the solutions, and so what we have to do is we really focus, and again, my group is 100% focused in on that, so. What part of our mission has been is, we're not necessarily know what customers are doing, so we're helping to understand what they're doing, and trying to help educate groups inside SAP to be more responsive and help them. >> So you mentioned having responsibility for some strategic accounts, about a hundred. Do those represent kind of a subset of some of the key areas in which you're looking for the voice of the customer, and their practice using your technology to influence the direction of some of the key technologies? >> Yes, 'cause I'd say they're some of the biggest, most strategic customers that we have, and so what we do a lot of is, we're able to, we align directly with the executives, at the customer, so one of things with Chief Customer Office, is we're aligned at the C level, so it's, the CIO, the CEO, the CFO, at that level, so we're able to say we heard directly from the leaders of the companies, our most important customers, key customers, and we're able to take that back the other areas of SAP, and say, this is the what the leadership's demanding, and that's what we're able to help them with. >> So, as we're going through this phase of digital transformation, through a lot of organizations, that audience is even more important than, what?! (chuckles) Tell me how, as digital transformation has become, more than just a buzzword but a imperative from the C-suite, from CEOs to CIOs, CMOs, CDO, all the C's, CXO! How has the conversation between those groups changed, from the SAP perspective? >> Yeah, I'll tell ya, that is, again, I'm not just sayin' that you are, you're hitting exactly what we focus in on because, traditionally SAP has been focused more on the CIO level, so it's more the IT groups of implemented ERP, it's been more of a back-office type solution, well now, what we're finding is the line of businesses are the people that are actually making the decisions. So what we're finding out is that, it's not necessarily so much that the, technically, how they work, it's more the business processes they have, and how we can help actually, basically automate, and help them run more smoothly. >> Yeah, Hasso Plattner actually, and some of the guys this morning during the keynote talked about that, in terms of, customers were saying, you know, I'm getting kind of confused, there's so many different product names, a lot of acquisitions, he was talking about that, we heard from customers that there was confusion there. So when he was talking about, in the context of C4 for example of, making things simpler to understand, but also to your point, the back office and the front office now has to be connected so they also talked about that, in terms of, the integration with SAP Cloud, and how they really focused on enabling wholistic integration because it's the processes that have to now communicate together, so that, a whole, kind of proactive, customer responsiveness, that was really apparent this morning. 46 years young SAP, you have a new initiative about the customer for life, tell us about that. >> Okay, so customer for life is a new initiative that we have, so what I told you, at the Chief Customer Office we've done, we're able to touch very few customers, but, you know, again, you know we have 156 thousand, in SAP North America, you know, multiply that all over the world, I mean, it's many customers, okay. So what we've tried to do, is take what we've done on a small scale in the Chief Customer Office, and make that pervasive throughout the whole company. And so what we're really good at too is actually, you know, understanding what the customers do, finding them a solution, but now what we wanna do is go through the whole life-cycle of what we do so, I mentioned, you know, having a customer executive assigned to every customer. Being able to be part of the steering committees that we have, and being able to follow them through so we can help guide them, so it's not only selling the solutions but actually helping them through all the way, so the new initiative we set is customer for life, it's something that we're rolling out right now, and we've had, and again, it's taking what we did in the Chief Customer Office and, you know, propagating that through the rest of SAP. >> So, this facility, you like to say it, 16 football fields, American football fields, so that's a big facility. I walked the facility this morning, got in about three thousand steps. Hundred plus partners on the floor, ranging from system integrators, technology partners, and infrastructure space, software SIs. Help us understand as SAP, 20 thousand plus people here at the show, a million people online engaging on SAPPHIRE, SAP is becoming a platform company. How has that changed your role, your conversations? >> Well, I think what has happened a lot is, especially in the cloud projects, again I'm gonna focus more on what I'm a part of is, you know, there's a lot of new partners that come up. Because what happened is that, you know, we acquired several companies, we did, you know Concur, Ariba, SuccessFactors, a lot of big companies, and a lot of different partners. So really what our role is, in the Chief Customer Office is, to basically, to help these partners to understand how to work together, and we do a lot of things in meetings, we have, what we do, is, it's usually like the three legged stool, it is, you know, it's SAP, the partner, and the customer together, and we all do that together. And what I've found is, some of the problems that we've had is not neces-- you know, I always say like, how can take the exact same solution, and it works well in one company, and it doesn't work in another company? And what it is, to your point, with all the partners here, is it's communication, are they working together, you know, is the partner, and SAP, and the customer all working together, and so that's what I'm really focused on today is meeting with all the, you know, do the SAPPHIREs, to meet with the partners, to make sure we're aligned, you know, talk about our key customers, and make sure that we're all working together. >> We talked to one of the gentleman yesterday who was running some of the communities around HANA and Leonardo and, just the massive amount of content that is being generated to enable and educate customers across 25 plus industries, was massive, as well as, leveraging that peer validation from customers, like you're saying, you know, some customers in certain industries have a ton of success with the same thing that others customers struggle, depending on a lot of different variables. So that sort of collaboration and communication, even within the SAP communities alone, was very apparent yesterday that that's one of the big drivers, of I'm sure, the customer for life initiative is, as you have evolved, so have your customers. One thing that struck me yesterday was, you know, looking at, you're now number 17 of the World's top most valuable brands up there with Apple, you know, products that we can engage with and, I saw on a bus yesterday some of the messaging, and ERP you can talk to, and hear from. (Keith laughing) So SAP really set a very lofty ambition of being up there with the Amazons, and the Coca-Colas, and the Googles, and now you have technology that people can, you know, like at home with their digital assistant, talk to and communicate with. I thought that was very powerful message. >> And I'd say that's, I'd say too that, you know, I've worked with SAP for 14 years, and when I came to SAP, nobody had really heard of SAP and what they were, they thought maybe, you know, sometimes on TV when you see SAP when it's translated in other languages or something, that's what they think of SAP, they don't really know what the company is but, yeah, it's been great to see how, you know, people would stop you, you know, whether you're wearin', you know, they'll see somethin' on your laptop, on your shirts or somethin' like that, yeah so it's been good. I think that's been a big focus of getting it out because, one thing is is we have 150 million cloud users, that's a lot of people, so a lot of people use SAP, so. Again, one of the cloud products that we have is called Concur, it's for expense and reporting, and so a lot of times people might not've heard of SAP, but they've heard of Concur, because they all do their expenses, that kinda stuff. So, exactly right, it is pretty good, you know, when you have even family members know who SAP is now. They've done a great job, you know, hiring, you know, with the market department and the people they've hired, it's been great, it's been good. >> So, okay, we talked a little bit about analytics and the customer experience as we're looking at intelligent business. Is that a message that's actually resonating with customers in that top 100 strategic accounts, are they using analytics to actually power business, What are some of the data analysis success stories? >> Yeah, I would say that, what I would say is that, what I've found a lot of times is that, you know, people can get the information in, but they need to be able to get the information out. And so, everybody across that has done it, so, I would just say almost every customer we have has basically needed to get that out, and do reporting and those kinda things, you know? So, part of what we do at the Chief Customer Office is, you know, not only, you know, help them with the reports that they have, but to be able to run that kinda stuff. >> You guys also have, you know, some really interesting use-cases, I'm a Formula One fan, I've worked with Formula One before, I'm, I understand it from a fan perspective. You guys are really involved in McLaren Motorsport, for example, from finance, to procurement, to manufacturing. How are you seeing some of these really big use-cases like Formula One, or Coca-Cola, infuse into some of the, you know, the mid-sized businesses, who, you say, might be using Concur for example. What is some of the value that a small company can get from the massive users? >> Yeah, well I'd say there's a lot of things, because what happens is that from those big massive customers that we have, we're able to put together as we call model company. And so what a model company is, is it takes the best practices you have and puts it into more of a, I'd say nothings out-of-the-box, but makes it much more easier to implement, to be able to do it, so what we're able to do is, you know, with the massive amounts of info like McLaren, I think Hasso mentioned what, there's 400 sensors that they're getting on their cars, and that kind of stuff. So basically being able to take all the information that we have, and then from that, distill it down into where it's a very, repeatable type instance we can use for other customers. So there's a lot, I mean that's what we do with a lot of the, what the customers have, we try to get that back to where other people can use it. >> A Formula One car is basically an IOT device. You said 400 sensors, generating a ton of data, per race weekend, times three days, times 20 events a year. I read from Gartner just the other day that by 2020, which is around the corner, there's expected to be 20 billion IOT devices. What are you hearing from your customer base regarding IOT and being able to synchronize this, you know, modern next-gen data center with myriad devices? >> Yeah, so that is one of our top initiatives that we have right now. Because, one of the things that we've done is, we have an offering that we have called Leonardo, and what Leonardo is, it was named after the inventor Leonardo da Vinci, alright? So, you know, in his time he was, you know, a great innovator, actually went and saw his house and went over to Europe, and I've done a lot with Leonardo, you know what I'm sayin'? To be able to do that, right? But what that is, is that's basically all about, you know, getting devices to be able to get that information in. Because what you do is, you have you know, thousands of sensors and stuff like that and a good, you asked me earlier about a good success story on that, is one of the ones that I think resonates the most on that is in Buenos Aires, they have a massive problem with rain, you know, it rains a lot, and they have severe flooding, and the architecture is antiquated. But what they've found, is the reason that they were having these flooding problems, is because the sewers and the drains were all getting clogged up. So what they did was, they put a sensor in every one of the drains to be able to make sure that they were unclogged and they were flowing freely. So what they did is, they were able to, if the water flow started going down they were able to empty out the drains, even with an antiquated sewer system, because they were keeping it aligned with, you know, using Leonardo now, they can go and keep it cleaned out, they've had massive rains and the flooding hasn't really been there where it is, so now, what's interesting is every time I go by and see a gutter that's all clogged up, I think, you know, they need Leonardo to be able to help! >> I was reading as well about Alicia Tillman, your CMO, who's been at the helm for about nine months now and, in the context of this desire to become one of the top global brands with an invisible product, she said, you know, that one of the most important things for SAP right now is brand narrative, messages and campaigns will change quarterly or, every six months as they should but, she said, you know, to be able to show the value of basically under-the-hood software, you've gotta be able to show how it transforms countries, lives, industries, and that's one of the things that I think is very, very palpable here at the event is how much impact SAP is making in, whether it's rhino conservation in Africa or, you know, helping water scarcity in India, the impact, which is really the most, the biggest validation that you get, right from the voice of your customers is massive. >> Yeah, and I'd say to that, you know I like to say that, you know, it sounds like, you know, yes we're a software company, and, you know, that kinda stuff, but, it is really a noble endeavor, because we are doing a lot of things to help people's lives, and to run their businesses better, and what you realize is that, Chief Customer Office sometimes we see that other side when the systems aren't running properly at times, you know, they're usually runnin' right, but sometimes they have problems, and when they do, you can just see the impact you have on, you know, people's lives and businesses and stuff like that, that it is really running, you know, it is core to what you have, you know. So I'll tell you one of the interesting things that SAP's involved in is, they do a lot with instant messaging, so they have a part of, one of the acquisitions we have does instant messaging, well, you don't think about that but like, when you use, let's say, Facebook Messenger, or something like that, those messages go inside an SAP infrastructure at times, right? So imagine, you know, if you can't change messages, or doin' those kinda things, you know, so. You're exactly right, it definitely does, what we're doing does really impact a lot of peoples lives, so it's important. >> Well mark, thanks so much for taking some time to stop by theCUBE and chat with us about what SAP is doing with customers, how they're really symbiotically working together with you to evolve and transform this company. >> I wanna say one other thing too, it's great to work with two professionals here, you guys have really helped me a lot. >> Aww! >> I don't do this a lot, but it really made me feel comfortable, so you, I appreciate your help, thank you. >> Our pleasure, thanks so much! And, so you're the reason SAPPHIRE's in Orlando, are you also the reason they got Justin Timberlake tomorrow night?! (Mark laughing) >> I would like that. But I would like to say real quick, one thing before we cut real quick, I would like to say one thing just about the NetApp partnership we have. So RJ Bibby is the person that I work with at NetApp, and, just what he's done to basically, because NetApp really helps run a lot of our infrastructure inside SAP, so it's success factors, some of the high-availability in things that we have, and just working with RJ, and kinda learning how we, how we work and can help other customers, they've really volunteered to help a lot of our customers, and so, I just wanna thank NetApp again for helping us sponsor this. >> Great, great closing. We wanna thank NetApp for having theCUBE in their booth. Lisa Martin, with Keith Townsend, we are at SAP SAPPHIRE NOW 2018, thanks for watching! (bubbly music)