from Boston Massachusetts it's the cube covering Activia 2019 data-driven to you by Activia welcome to Boston everybody this is Dave Volante and I'm here with stupid man finally still in our hometown you're watching the cube the leader in live tech coverage we're covering actifi Oh data-driven hashtag data-driven 19 activity it was a company that is focus started focused on copy data management they sort of popularized the term the I the concept the idea of data virtualization there's big data digital transformation all the buzz it's kind of been a tailwind for the company and we followed them quite closely over the years poly st. Claire is here she's the CEO of the state of Massachusetts that's chief of ditch and chief data officer Holly thanks for coming on the Q thanks for having me so it's kind of rare that somebody shares the title of chief digital officer of chief data officer I think it's rare right now I think that would change you think it will change I think those two roles will come together I just think data fuels our digital world and it both creates the content and also monitors how we're doing and it's just inevitably I think either they're gonna be joined at the hip or it's gonna be the same person that's interesting I always thought the chief data officer sort of emerged from this wonky back-office role data quality of this careful the word walking okay well yeah let's talk about that but the chief digital officer is kind of the mover the shaker has a little marketing genius but but okay so you see those two roles coming together that maybe makes sense because why because there's there some tension in a lot of organizations between those two roles well I think the challenge with the way that sometimes people think about data is they think about it's only a technical process data is actually very creative and you also have to tell a story in order to be good with it it's the same thing as marketing but it's just a little bit of a different hue a different type of audience a different type of pace there's a technical component to the data work but I'm looking at my organization that I'm surrounded by additional technical folks CTO CSO privacy officer CIO so we have a lot of supports that might take away some of those roles are scrunched in under the data officer or the digital so I used to turn wonky before it kind of triggered you a little bit but but you're a modeler you're a data scientist your development programmer right no but I know enough to I know enough to read code and get in trouble okay so you can direct coders and you have data scientists working for you yeah right so you've got that entire organization underneath you and your your mission is blank fill in the blank so our mission is to use the best information technology to ensure that every users experience with the Commonwealth is fast easy and wicked awesome awesome Holly our team just got back from a very large public sector event down in DC and digging into you know how our agency is doing with you know cloud force initiatives how are they doing the city environments you were state of Massachusetts and you know rolled out that that first chief data if you keep dipped officer gets a little bit of insight inside how Massachusetts doing with these latest waves of innovation uh well you know we have our legacy systems and as our opportunities come up to improve those systems our reinvest in them we are taking a step forward to cloud we're not so dogmatic that it's cloud only but it's definitely cloud when it's appropriate I do think we'll always have some on-prem services but really when it's possible whether it's a staff service off-the-shelf or it's a cloud environment to make sense than we are moving to that in your keynote this morning you you talked about something called data minimalism yeah and wonder if you could explain that for audience because for the longest time it's been well you want to hoard all the data you want to get all the data and you know what do you do with it how do you manage you right right I mean data's only as good as your ability to use it and I often find that we're ingesting all this data and we don't really know what to do with it or really rather our business leaders and decision-makers can't quite figure out how to connect that to the mission or to act properly interrogate the data to get the information they want and so this idea is an idea that's sort of coming a little bit out of Europe and or some of the other trends we see around some cyber security and hacking worlds and the idea is this actually came from fjords Digital Trends for 2019 is data minimalism the idea is that you strongly connect your business objectives to the data collection program that you have you don't just collect data until you're sure that it supports your objectives so you know one of the things that I also talked about in the keynote was not just data minimalism but doing a try test iterate approach we often collect data hoping to see that we can create a change I think we need to prove that we can create the change before we do a widespread scalable data collection program because often we collect data and you still can't see what you're doing has an effect within the data the signals too strong or too too weak or you're asking the wrong question of the data or it's the wrong plectra collection of the technique and that's largely driven from a sort of privacy a privacy privacy the reality of how costly sometimes the kennedys but you know storage of data is cheap but the actual reality of moving it and saving it and knowing where it is and accessing it later that takes time and energy of your of your actual people so I think it's just important for us to think carefully about a resource in government we have a little less resources sometimes in the private sector so we're very strategic on what we do and so I think we need to really think about the data we use if the pendulum swings remember back to the days of you know 2006 the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure said okay you got to keep electronic records for whatever seven years of depending on industry and people said okay let's get rid of it as soon as we can data was viewed as a liability and then of course all the big data height we've talked about a little bit in your in your speech everybody said I could collect everything throw it into a data Lake and we all know those became data swamps so do you feel like the pendulum is swinging and there's maybe a little balance are we reaching an equilibrium is it going to be a you know hard shift back to data as a liability what are your thoughts well I think isn't with any trend there's always a little bit of a pendulum swing as we're learning it's with it with the equilibrium is equilibrium is I think that's a great word I think the piece that I neglected to mention is the relationship to the consumer trust you know for us in government we have to have the trust of our constituents we do have a higher bar than public sector in terms of handling data in a way that's respectful of individuals privacy and their security of their data and so I think to the extent that we are able to lend transparency and show the utility and the data we're using and that will gain the trust of our users or customers but if we continue to do things behind the scenes and not be overt about it I think then that can cause more problems I think we face is organizations to ask ourselves is having more data worth the sort of vulnerability introduces and the possible liability of trust of our of our customers when you betray to test over your customers it's really hard to replace that and so you know to a certain extent I think we should be more deliberate about our data and earn the trust of our customers okay how how does Massachusetts look at the boundary of data between the public sector and the private sector I've talked to you know some states where you know we're helping business off parking by giving you know new mobile apps access to that information you talked a little bit about health care you know I've done interviews with the massive macleod initiative here locally how do you look at that balance of sharing I think it is a real balance you know I don't think we do very much of it yet and we certainly don't share data that were not allowed to by law and we have very strict laws here in Massachusetts the stricter at the ten most states and so I think it's very strategic when we do share data we are looking for opportunities when we can when I talk about demand driven data I look forward to opening the conversation a little bit to ask people what data are they looking for to ask businesses and different institutions we have throughout the Commonwealth what data would help you do your job better and grow our economy and our jobs and I think that's a conversation we need to have over time to figure out what the right balances someday it'll be easier for us to share than others and some will never be able to share the first data scientist I've ever met is somebody I interviewed the amazing Hilary Mason and she said something that I want to circle back to something you said in your talk if she said the hardest part of my job or one of the hardest parts is people come to me with data and and it's the most valuable thing I can do is show them which questions to ask and you have talked about well what's a lot of times you don't know what questions to ask until you look at the data or vice versa what comes first the chicken or the egg what's your experience pin well I do think we need to be driven by the business objectives and goals it doesn't mean there's not an iterative process in there somewhere but you know data wonks we can we can just throw data all day long and still might not give you the answer there forward but I think it's really important for us to be driven by the business and I think executives don't know how to ask the questions of the data they don't know how to interrogate it or honestly more realistically we don't have a date of actually answers the question they want to know so we often have to use proxies for that information but I do think if there's an iterative after you get to a starting point so I do think knowing what the business question is first I know you gotta go but I want to ask your last question bring it back to the state where both Massachusetts residents and your services it sounds like you're picking off some some good wins with a through the fast ROI I mean you mentioned you know driver's license renewals etc how about procurement has procurement been a challenge from the state standpoint you are you looking at sort of the digital process and how to streamline procurement that is a conversation that the secretary what is currently in and I think it's a good one I don't think we have any any solutions yet but I think we have a lot of the issues that were struggling with but we're not alone all public sectors struggling with this type of procurement question so we're working on it all right last question there's quick thoughts on you know what you've seen here I know you're in and out but data-driven yeah it's a great theme it's a really exciting agenda there's people for all these different organizations and approaches to data-driven you know from movie executives and casting to era it's just really exciting to see the program it's Nate Claire thanks so much I'm coming on the queue thank you great to meet you okay keep it right there everybody we'll be back with our next guest right after this short break well the cube is here at data-driven day one special coverage we'll be right back

>> Narrator: From around the globe, it's theCUBE with digital coverage of Actifio Data Driven 2020, brought to you by Actifio. >> Hi everybody this is Dave Vellante, full of preview of Actifio Data Driven, and with me is Brian Reagan who is a long time cube alumni, good friend. Brian, awesome to see you thanks for coming on and help us set up Data Driven >> Dave it's always a pleasure to be here, thanks for having me. >> So this is one of our favorite events of the season, not only because it's historically been in Boston, but it's a really good intimate event, lot of customer content. Unfortunately this year, of course everything has gone virtual but tell us about that, what do you guys got planned for Data Driven this year? >> Well again we're delighted to be able to put the show on, in spite of all of the challenges of travel and face to face. As you know from years past, Data Driven has always been sort of by the customers for the customers, very much an event that is driven around understanding how customers are using data strategically, and how Actifio is helping them do that to power their businesses. This year is no different, I think what we've done is we've taken the best of the physical events, which is really facilitating fireside chats and panels of people using our technology to move the business forward with data, but also added a lot of things that frankly are impossible to do when you're strained by a physical event, which is be able to run a series of on demand technical sessions. Our technical tracks are always standing room only, so now we can offer more content, more discreet package content that can be consumed the day of the event and on for a year plus after the event. So we're excited to really sort of mix the best of both worlds virtual and the forums that have worked so well for us in the physical events. >> Well it's like I said I mean, lots of these events are sort of vendor fests, but what you do with Data Driven is you bring in the customer's voice. And I remember last year in theCUBE, we had Holly st. Clair who was with the state of Massachusetts, she was awesome. We had a guest from DraftKings, which was really, really tremendous. Of course, you see what's happening with those guys now just exploding. >> Exactly. >> But we also had a lot of fun, when of course Ash comes on, and all the Actifio folk, but we had Frank Gens on, the first and only time we've ever had him on theCUBE, he's now retired from IDC, I guess semiretired. We had Duplessie on, which was a lot of fun. So it's just a good vibe. >> Yeah, we made a conscious decision to your point not to avoid the traditional vendor fest, and bludgeoning people with PowerPoint throughout the day, and really wanted to make it spin it around, and have the customers tell their stories in their own words, and really talk about the themes that are both common, in terms of challenges, ways that they've addressed those challenges, but also dig into the real implications of when they do solve these challenges, what are the unintended consequences? It's sort of like the... In a lot of ways I think about the journey that customers went through with VMware and with the ability to spin up VMs effortlessly, was a fantastic first step, and then all of a sudden they realized they had all of these spun up Vms that were consuming resources that they didn't necessarily had thought about at the very beginning. I think that our customers as they progress through their journey with Actifio, once they realize the power of being able to access data and deliver data, no matter how big it is, in any form factor in any cloud, there's incredible power there, but there also comes with that a real need to make sure that the governance and controls and management systems are in place to properly deliver that. Particularly today when everything is distributed, everything is essentially at arms length, so that's part of the fun of these events is really being able to hear all of the ways these unique customers are, adding value, delivering value, gaining value, from the platform. >> What's it's interesting you mentioned VMs, it was like life changing when you saw your first VM get spun up and you're like, wow, this is unbelievable, and then it was so easy to spin up. and then you just save VM creep and copy creep. >> Right. >> And you're seeing some similar things now with cloud I mean example is the cloud data warehouses is so easy to spin those things up now. The CFOs are looking at the bill going Whoa, what are we doing here? >> (laughs) >> You're going to see the same thing >> Exactly. >> with containers as you begin to persist containers, you're going to have the same problem. So you guys created the category, it's always a marketing executives dreams to be able to create a category. You guys created the Copy Data Management category, and of course, you've extended that. But that was really good, it was something that you guys set forth and then all the analysts picked up on it, people now use that as a term and it kind of resonates with everybody. >> Right, right. It was bittersweet but also very satisfying to start to see other vendors come out with their own Copy Data Management offerings, and so yes the validating that in fact this is a real problem in the enterprise continues to be a real problem in the enterprise, and by using technologies that Actifio really pioneered and patented quite a bit of foundational technologies around, we're able to help customers address those copy data challenges, those spiraling costs of managing all of these duplicate, physical instances of data. And to your point, to some degree when you're on-prem in a data center and you've already bought your storage array. Okay, I'm consuming 20% more of the Ray or 100% more of the array than I really need to be, but I've already paid for the array. When it comes to cloud, those bills are adding up hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, and those are real costs, and so in many ways cloud is actually highlighting the power and frankly the problem of copy data, far more than the on-prem phenomenon ever did. >> Yeah I was on the phone with a former CIO, COO now of a healthcare organization, and he was saying to me there's a dark side of CapEx to OPEX, which is now that he's a COO he's like really concerned about the income statement and the variability of those costs, and so to your point I mean it's a big issue, the convenience seems to be outweighing some of that concern but nonetheless lack of predictability is a real concern there. >> Absolutely, absolutely. And I think we see that... You mentioned data lakes, and whether you call it a data lake or you just call it a massive data instance, one of the speakers of Data Driven this year is a customer of our Century Data Systems down in Florida. And they have 120 terabyte database that actually they're using, and this is an incredible story that we're excited to have them share with the world during Data Driven. They're using it to help the federal government get better data faster on COVID treatments and the efficacy of those treatments, and so to even consider being able to rapidly access and manage 120 terabyte instance. It breaks the laws of physics frankly. But again with Copy Data Management, we have the ability to help them really extend and really enhance their business and ultimately enhance the data flows that are hopefully going to accelerate the access to a vaccine for us in North American and worldwide, quite frankly. >> That's awesome, that's awesome. Now let's talk a little bit more about Data Driven what we can expect. Of course, the last couple of years you've been the host of Data Driven. They pulled a Ricky gervais' on you >> (Laughs loudly) like get the golden gloves, he's no longer being invited to host, but I think probably for different reasons, but what are some the major themes that we can expect this year? >> Yeah, we were disappointed that we couldn't get Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. >> (laughs quietly) I think we decided that in a virtual construct, the host duties were pretty amenable. So among the many things I talked about Sentry Data Systems and we have many customers who are going to be joining us and telling their stories. And again from accelerating data analytics to accelerating DevOps initiatives, to accelerating a move to the cloud, we're going to hear all of those different use cases described. One of the things that is different this year and we're really excited. Gene Kim sort of the author and noted DevOps guru, author of The Phoenix Project and The Unicorn Project, he's going to be joining us. We had previously intended to do a road show with Gene this year and obviously those plans got changed a bit. So really excited to have him join us, talk about his point of view around DevOps. Certainly it's a hugely important use case for us, really important for many of our customers, and actually registrant's between now and the event, which is September 15th and 16th, we'll get an eCopy an e-book copy of his Unicorn Project book. So we're eager to have people register and if they haven't already read him then I think they're going to be really pleasantly surprised to see how accessible his materials are, and yet how meaningful and how powerful they can be in terms of articulating the journeys that many of these businesses are going through. >> Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up. I'm stucked I have not read that material, but I've heard a lot about it, and when I signed up I saw that, said great I'm going to get the free book. So I'm going to check that out, >> Yeah It's obviously a very, very hot topic. Well Brian, I really appreciate you coming on, and setting up the event. What are the details? So where do I go to sign up? When is the event? What's the format? Give us the lowdown. >> It is September 15th and 16th, actifio.com will guide you through the registration process. You'll be able to create the event based on the content that you're eager to participate in. And again not only on the 15th and 16th, but then into the future, you'll be able to go back and re access or access content that you didn't have the time to do during the event window. So we're really excited to be able to offer that as an important part of the event. >> Fantastic and of course theCUBE will be there doing its normal wall to wall coverage. Of course, this time virtual, and you'll see us on social media with all the clips and all the work on Silicon Angle. So Brian great to see you and we will see you online in September. >> Thanks, Dave. >> All right, and thank you. Go to actifio.com, sign up register for Data Driven, this is Dave Vellante for theCUBE, we'll see you next time. (upbeat music)

>> from Boston, Massachusetts. It's the queue covering active eo 2019. Data driven you by activity. >> Hi. We're right outside of the Boston Haba. You're watching >> the cube on stew Minimum in. And this is active Geo data driven. 2019 due date. Two days digging into, You >> know, the role of data inside Cos on, you know, in an ever changing world, happy to welcome to the program of first time guests are China Oven countrymen who's a research manager at I. D. C. Coming to us from across the pond in London. Thanks so much for joining us. Pleasure. So tell us a little bit. I d c. We know. Well, you know, the market landscapes, you know, watching what's happening. Thie said it 77 Zita bites that was put up in the keynote. Came came from I D. C. Tells you you're focused. >> Yeah, so I'm part of the data protection and storage research team, But I have, ah, European focus. I covered the Western European markets where data protection is almost off a neurotic interest to us. So a lot of our investment is actually made on the context of data protection. And how do I become data driven without compromising on security and sovereignty and data locality. So that's something that I look at. I'm also part of our broader multi cloud infrastructure team on also develops practice. I'm looking at all these modern new trends from data perspective as well. So it's kind of nice being >> keeping you busy, huh? Yeah. So about a year ago, every show that I went to there would be a big clock up on the Kino stage counting down until gpr went way actually said on the Q. Many times it's like we'll know when GPR starts with lawsuits. Sister and I feel like it was a couple of days, if not a couple of weeks before some of the big tech firms got sued for this. So here we are 2019. It's been, you know, been a while now since since since this launch. How important is GDP are you know what? How is that impacting customers and kind of ripple effect? Because, you know, here in the States, we're seeing some laws in California and beyond that are following that. But they pushed back from the Oh, hey, we're just gonna have all the data in the world and we'll store it somewhere sure will protect it and keep it secure. But but But >> yeah, yeah, so it's suggestive. Here is a game changer and it's interesting you said this big clock ticking and everybody has been talking about it. So when the European Commission >> announced repairs >> coming, organizations had about two years to actually prepare for it. But there were a lot of naysayers, and they thought, This is not gonna happen. The regulators don't have enough resources to actually go after all of these data breaches, and it's just too complicated. Not everyone's going complaints just not gonna happen. But then they realised that the regulators we're sticking to it on towards the end. Towards the last six months in the race to GDP, and there was this helter skelter running. Their organizations were trying to just do some Die Ryan patch of exercise to have that minimum viable compliance. So there they wanted to make sure that they don't go out of business. They don't have any major data breaches when Jean Pierre comes a difference that that was the story of 2018 although they have so much time to react they didn't on towards the end. They started doing a lot of these patch up work to make sure they had that minimum by the compliance. But over time, what we're seeing is that a lot off a stewed organizations are actually using GDP are as to create that competitive differentiations. If you look at companies like Barclays, they have been so much on top of that game on DH. They include that in their marketing strategies and the corporate social responsibility to say that, Hey, you know our business is important to us, but your privacy and your data is much more valuable to us, and that kind of instantly helps them build that trust. So they have big GDP, our compliance into their operations so much and so well that they can actually sell those kind of GPR consultancy services because they're so good at it. And that's what we are seeing is happening 2019 on DH. Probably the next 12 to 18 months will be about scaling on operational izing GDP are moving from that minimum viable compliance. >> Its interest weighed a conversation with Holly St Clair, whose state of Massachusetts and in our keynote this morning she talked about that data minimalist. I only want as much data as I know what I'm going to do. How I'm goingto leverage it, you know, kind of that pendulum swing back from the I'm goingto poured all the data and think about it later. It is that Did you see that is a trend with, you know, is that just governments is that, you know, you seeing that throughout industries and your >> interesting. So there was seven gpr came into existence. There were a lot of these workshops that were happening for on for organizations and how to become GDP. And there was this Danish public sector organization where one of the employees went to do that workshop was all charged up, and he came back to his employer and said, Hey, can you forget me on it Took that organization about 14 employees and three months to forget one person. So that's the amount of data they were holding in. And they were not dilating on all the processes were manual which took them so long to actually forget one person on. So if you don't cleanse a pure data act now meeting with all these right to be forgotten, Andi, all these specific clauses within GPR is going to be too difficult. And it's going to just eat up your business >> tryingto connecting the dots here. One of the one of the big stumbling blocks is if you look at data protection. If I've got backup, if I've got archive, I mean, if I've taken a snapshot of something and stuck that under a mountain in a giant tape and they say forget about me Oh, my gosh, Do I have to go retrieve that? I need to manage that? The cost could be quite onerous. Help! Help us connect the dots as to what that means to actually, you know, what are the ramifications of this regulation? >> Yeah, So I think so. Judy PR is a beast. It's a dragon off regulations. It's important to dice it to understand what the initial requirements are on one was the first step is to get visibility and classified the data as to what is personal data. You don't want to apply policies to all the data because I might be some garbage in there, so you need to get visibility on A says and classified data on what is personal data. Once you know what data is personal, what do you want to retain? That's when you start applying policies too. Ensure that they are safe and they're anonymous. Pseudonym ized. If you want to do analytics at a later stage on DH, then you think about how you meet. Individual close is so see there's a jeep airframe, but you start by classifying data. Then you apply specific policies to ensure you protect on back up the personal data on. Then you go about meeting the specific requirements. >> What else can you tell us about kind of European markets? You know, I I know when I look at the the cloud space, governance is something very specific to, and I need to make sure my data doesn't leave the borders and like what other trends in you know issues when you hear >> it from Jenny Peered forced a lot ofthe existential threat to a lot of companies. Like, say, hyper scale. Er's SAS men does so they were the first ones to actually become completely compliant to understand their regulations, have European data data hubs, and to have those data centres like I think At that time, Microsoft had this good good collaboration with T systems to have a local data center not controlled by Microsoft, but by somebody who is just a German organizations. You cannot have data locality more than that, right? So they were trying different innovative ways to build confidence among enterprises to make sure that cloud adoption continues on what was interesting. That came out from a research was that way thought, Gee, DPR means people's confidence and cloud is going to plunge. People's confidence in public cloud is going to pledge. That didn't happen. 42% of organizations were still going ahead with their cloud strategies as is, but it's just that they were going to be a lot more cautious. And they want to make sure that the applications and data that they were putting in the cloud was something that they had complete visibility in tow on that didn't have too much of personal data and even if it had, they had complete control over. So they had a different strategy off approaching public cloud, but it didn't slow them down. But over time they realised that to get that control ofthe idea and to get that control of data. They need to have that multiple multi cloud strategy because Cloud had to become a two way street. They need to have an exit strategy. A swell. So they tried to make sure that they adopted multiple cloud technologies and have the data interoperability. Ahs Well, because data management was one of their key key. Top of my prayer. >> Okay, last question I had for you. We're here at the active you event. What? What do you hear from your customers about Octavio? Any research that you have relevant, what >> they're doing, it's going interesting. So copy data management. That's how active you started, right? They created a market for themselves in this competition, a management and be classified copy data management within replication Market on replication is quite a slow market, but this copy data management is big issue, and it's one of the fastest growing market. So So So they started off from a good base, but they created a market for themselves and people started noticing them, and now they have kind of grown further and grown beyond and tried to cover the entire data management space. Andi, I think what's interesting and what's going to be interesting is how they keep up the momentum in building that infrastructure, ecosystem and platform ecosystem. Because companies are moving from protecting data centers to protecting centers of data on if they can help organizations protect multiple centers of data through a unified pane of glass, I have a platform approach to data management. Then they can help organizations become data drivers, which gives them the competitive advantage. So if they can keep up that momentum there going great guns, >> Thank you so much for joining us in Cheshire, sharing the data that you have in the customer viewpoints from Europe. So we'll be back with more coverage here from Active EO data driven 2019 in Boston. Mess fuses on stew Minimum. Thanks for watching the Q. Thank you.