>> Live from Orlando, Florida, it's theCUBE covering Microsoft Ignite. Brought to you by Cohesity and theCUBE's ecosystem partners. >> Welcome back, everyone, to theCUBE's live coverage of Microsoft Ignite here in Orlando, Florida. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight, along with my co-host, Stu Miniman. We're joined by Nicola Carotti. He is the head of Cloud and Collaboration at Intesasanpaolo. Thank you so much for coming on theCUBE. >> Thank you, thank you for invitation. >> So Intesasanpaolo is the largest banking group in Italy. Tell our viewers a little bit about the bank and also about what you do there. >> So first of all, a few words about myself: I'm 47 years old and am married with a lovely wife and two daughters. Probably they are watching me from Italy. >> (laughs) Hello! >> About my job, I've worked for Intesasanpaolo for 17 years, a lot of time. It's always fun, is a great job, is a great place to work for. Intesasanpaolo is now the biggest bank in Italy, and one of the top banks in Europe. We also have a business plan to help us to grow a little bit more and more to become the first digital bank in Europe. We also have a business plan for IT, of course. We are working on innovation, on Collaboration staff, to increase the productivity of the people. And we will talk later about it. Also the digitalization of the bank in the process. So Intesasanpaolo is now, for me, is a good place to work. It's a good bank in Italy. We do also a lot for social. We invest in social, and we give money back to the community and to Italy. It's very important for me. >> So talk a little bit about what your role is at the bank. >> I am the head of Cloud and Collaboration. In the past I led the data center infrastructure from mainframe to open system. Now I am the head of Cloud and Collaboration as told before. It's a very important role for me because Cloud and Collaboration are important topics for us, and we work a lot on them. About Cloud, we work on the strategy, we work on the integration platform to merge different functionalities. On the Collaboration, we are working on a modern workplace. >> So, Nicola, it's interesting to hear you talk about cloud. We're here at the Microsoft show. Microsoft plays across a lot of different areas. What's the relationship between the bank and Microsoft? >> Microsoft, obviously, is a big partner for us. We are a big customer for Microsoft. It's, I think, through Microsoft Cloud. In the last years, Microsoft has the biggest growing cloud that I've ever seen. What I can say, it's a very enterprise-ready cloud platform. It's easier to manage a foreign, big enterprise, like us. We are still using cloud-- When I talk about cloud, I think hybrid model. And we have important private cloud installation. We deliver 90% of our machine totally automatically through our private cloud. And we can also extend our data center on the public cloud in Asia. We have a connection between our data center and the Microsoft data center in a hybrid model. So it's an extension of the data center. We also deliver the 40%-- 45% of all our delivery operation are made through our private cloud portal. So it's an important investment that we did on cloud. >> We know data is very important to all companies, especially not only security, but how you can leverage data is important for financial institutions like yourself. You've mentioned a hybrid model. That's something we've been hearing from a lot of customers. We're here in the Cohesity booth, and I understand you're using them. Maybe talk a little about how you think about the data protection in a multi-cloud world. >> We started to use Cohesity some years ago. We were the first customer in Europe, and the first bank in the world. Very early adopter. Few words about Cohesity: Cohesity is a very smart company and very nice people to work with. So we started to work together to increase the functionalities that they provide, to be more enterprise ready. Now, speaking about the data, obviously for a bank, the data protection is one of the main points. And Cohesity helped us to do an easier process to manage data. We are working with them to increase the data protected with Cohesity as a secondary storage. We are looking also at new functionality that they are providing. It's the connection to the cloud. So I think they can help us, to enable us to use a little bit more of the cloud in that hybrid model. So enable the hybrid model of the cloud, can be easier for us, I think. >> One of the biggest companies-- One of the biggest challenges that so many companies face is staying innovative and staying ahead of the game. How do you and your team-- I know you said workplace productivity, collaboration are really important things for you. How do you keep your team working at the cutting edge? >> Nice question. I can speak about technical innovation, because in our technical department, the IT department, we work a lot on innovation. We have a model. We define a model for the age of innovation. It seems a contradiction, but we decided to invest in innovation. Initially we find some prosperous company. We have some connection in Sillicon Valley, with Italian and European investors, and this is why we became the first customer for Cohesity when Cohesity was so small. They had a great road map but they were very small. Like them, we also adopted Damonte it's a container as a surface platform. When we adopted last year, they were very small as well. But they are smart guys as well, nice company, good investor. The DNA of the company seems good. So we decided to adopt the technology. It's also an opportunity for my people, for the people of the bank, for the people of IT, to stay in touch with the innovative community of Sillicon Valley, of the investor. It's very important for them, because in the past, working IT in a bank wasn't so nice. So this is why we invest a lot in innovation, and this is why our people love to do that. >> Finally, you're here in the States for only a couple of days. You're heading back to Italy. At this conference, what has impressed you? What do you think you will take away from what you're learning here, what you're seeing, what you're hearing, and share with your colleagues back home? >> First of all, the relationships. I met a lot of people, a lot of business, other customers, a lot of banks, so I will have a lunch with another bank, big bank in Europe so we can exchange. We saw that we have the problems, the same path. We are all working in the same area. It's good, it's comfortable for us. The other point is we saw, with my colleagues here, we saw some nice innovative companies to work with. It's a very interesting, was very useful for me. >> Nicola Carotti of Intesasanpaola, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's been really fun talking to you. >> Thank you. Thank you so much. >> I'm Rebecca Knight, for Stu Miniman, We will have more of theCUBE's live coverage of Microsoft's Ignite coming up in just a little bit.