(upbeat music) >> Welcome back to theCUBE's continuous coverage of AWS storage day. My name is Dave Vellante and we're here from Seattle. And we're going to look at the really hard workloads, those business and mission critical workloads, the most sensitive data. They're harder to move to the cloud. They're hardened. They have a lot of technical debt. And the blocker in some cases has been storage. Ashish Palekar is here. He's the general manager of EBS snapshots, and he's joined by Cami Tavares who's a senior manager of product management for Amazon EBS. Folks, good to see you. >> Ashish: Good to see you again Dave. >> Dave: Okay, nice to see you again Ashish So first of all, let's start with EBS. People might not be familiar. Everybody knows about S3 is famous, but how are customers using EBS? What do we need to know? >> Yeah, it's super important to get the basics, right? Right, yeah. We have a pretty broad storage portfolio. You talked about S3 and S3 glacier, which are an object and object and archival storage. We have EFS and FSX that cover the file site, and then you have a whole host of data transfer services. Now, when we think about block, we think of a really four things. We think about EBS, which is the system storage for EC2 volumes. When we think about snapshots, which is backups for EBS volumes. Then we think about instant storage, which is really a storage that's directly attached to an instance and manages and then its life cycle is similar to that of an instance. Last but not the least, data services. So things like our elastic volumes capability of fast snapshot restore. So the answer to your question really is EBS is persistent storage for EC2 volumes. So if you've used EC2 instances, you'll likely use EBS volumes. They service boot volumes and they service data volumes, and really cover a wide gamut of workloads from relational databases, no SQL databases, file streaming, media and coding. It really covers the gamut of workloads. >> Dave: So when I heard SAN in the cloud, I laughed out loud. I said, oh, because I could think about a box, a bunch of switches and this complicated network, and then you're turning it into an API. I was like, okay. So you've made some announcements that support SAN in the cloud. What, what can you tell us about? >> Ashish: Yeah, So SANs and for customers and storage, those are storage area networks, really our external arrays that customers buy and connect their performance critical and mission critical workloads. With block storage and with EBS, we got a bunch of customers that came to us and said, I'm thinking about moving those kinds of workloads to the cloud. What do you have? And really what they're looking for and what they were looking for is performance availability and durability characteristics that they would get from their traditional SANs on premises. And so that's what the team embarked on and what we launched at reinvent and then at GEd in July is IO2 block express. And what IO2 block express does is it's a complete ground app, really the invention of our storage product offering and gives customers the same availability, durability, and performance characteristics that can, we'll go into little later about that they're used to in their on premises. The other thing that we realized is that it's not just enough to have a volume. You need an instance that can drive that kind of throughput and IOPS. And so coupled with our trends in EC2 we launched our R5b that now triples the amount of IOPS and throughput that you can get from a single instance to EBS storage. So when you couple the sub millisecond latency, the capacity and the performance that you get from IO2 block express with R5b, what we hear from customers is that gives them enough of the performance availability characteristics and durability characteristics to move their workloads from on premises, into the cloud, for the mission critical and business critical apps. >> Dave: Thank you for that. So Cami when I, if I think about how the prevailing way in which storage works, I drop off a box at the loading dock and then I really don't know what happens. There may be a service organization that's maybe more intimate with the customer, but I don't really see the innovations and the use cases that are applied clouds, different. You know, you live it every day. So you guys always talk about customer inspired innovation. So what are you seeing in terms of how people are using this capability and what innovations they're driving? >> Cami: Yeah, so I think when we look at the EBS portfolio and this, the evolution over the years, you can really see that it was driven by customer need and we have different volume types and they have very specific performance characteristics, and they're built to meet these unique needs of customer workloads. So I'll tell you a little bit about some of our specific volume types to kind of illustrate this evolution over the years. So starting with our general purpose volumes, we have many customers that are using these volumes today. They really are looking for high performance at a low cost, and you have all kinds of transactional workloads and low-latency interactive applications and boot volumes, as Ashish mentioned. And they tell us, the customer is using these general purpose volumes, they tell us that they really like this balanced cost and performance. And customers also told us, listen, I have these more demanding applications that need higher performance. I need more IOPS, more throughput. And so looking at that customer need, we were really talking about these IO intensive applications like SAP HANA and Oracle and databases that require just higher durability. And so we looked at that customer feedback and we launched our provisioned IOPS IO2 volume. And with that volume, you get five nines of durability and four times the IOPS that you would get with general purpose volumes. So it's a really compelling offering. Again, customers came to us and said, this is great. I need more performance, I need more IOPS, more throughput, more storage than I can get with a single IO2 volume. And so these were talking about, you mentioned mission critical applications, SAP HANA, Oracle, and what we saw customers doing often is they were striping together multiple IO2 volumes to get the maximum performance, but very quickly with the most demanding applications, it got to a point where we have more IO2 volumes that you want to manage. And so we took that feedback to heart and we completely reinvented the underlying EBS hardware and the software and networking stacks. And we'll launched block express. With block express, you can get four times the IOPS throughput and storage that you would get with a single io2 volume. So it's a really compelling offering for customers. >> Dave: If I had to go back and ask you, what was the catalyst, what was the sort of business climate that really drove the decision here. Was that people were just sort of fed up with you know, I'll use the phrase, the undifferentiated, heavy lifting around SAN, what was it, was it COVID driven? What was the climate? >> You know, it's important to recognize when we are talking about business climate today, every business is a data business and block storage is really a foundational part of that. And so with SAN in the cloud specifically, we have seen enterprises for several years, buying these traditional hardware arrays for on premises SANs. And it's a very expensive investment. Just this year alone, they're spending over $22 billion on SANs. And with this old model on premises SANs, you would probably spend a lot of time doing this upfront capacity planning, trying to figure out how much storage you might need. And in the end, you'd probably end up overbuying for peak demand because you really don't want to get stuck, not having what you need to scale your business. And so now with block express, you don't have to do that anymore. You pay for what you need today, and then you can increase your storage as your business needs change. So that's cost and cost is a very important factor. But really when we're talking to customers and enterprises that are looking for SAN in the cloud, the number one reason that they want to move to the cloud with their SANs and these mission, critical workloads is agility and speed. And it's really transformational for businesses to be able to change the customer experience for their customers and innovate at a much faster pace. And so with the block express product, you get to do that much faster. You can go from an idea to an implementation orders of magnitude faster. Whereas before if you had these workloads on premises, it would take you several weeks just to get the hardware. And then you have to build all this surrounding infrastructure to get it up and running. Now, you don't have to do that anymore. You get your storage in minutes, and if you change your mind, if your business needs change, if your workloads change, you can modify your EBS volume types without interrupting your workload. >> Dave: Thank you for that. So Cami kind of addressed some of this, but I know store admins say, don't touch my SAN, I'm not moving it. This is a big decision for a lot of people. So kind of a two-part question, you know, why now, what do people need to know? And give us the north star close it out with, with where you see the future. >> Ashish: Yeah, so let's, I'll kick things off and then Cami, do jump in. So first of the volume is one part of the story, right? And with IO2 block express, I think we've given customers an extremely compelling offering to go build their mission critical and business critical applications on. We talked about the instance type R5b in terms of giving that instance level performance, but all this is on the foundation of AWS in terms of availability zones and regions. So you think about the constructs and we talk them in terms of building blocks, but our building blocks are really availability zones and regions. And that gives you that core availability infrastructure that you need to build your mission critical and business critical applications. You then take layer on top of that our regional footprint, right. And now you can spin up those workloads globally, if you need to. And then last but not the least, once you're in AWS, you have access to other services. Be it AI, be it ML, be it our relational database services that you can start to think about undifferentiated, heavy lifting. So really you get the smorgasbord really from the availability footprint to global footprint and all the way up to sort of our service stack that you get access to. >> Dave: So that's really thinking out of the box. We're out of time. Cami we'll give you the last word. >> Cami: I just want to say, if you want to learn more about EBS, there's a deep dive session with our principal engineer, Marc Olson later today. So definitely join that. >> Dave: Folks, thanks so much for coming to theCUBE. (in chorus )Thank you. >> Thank you for watching. Keep it right there for more great content from AWS storage day from Seattle.

(Upbeat intro music) >> Thanks guys. Hi everybody. Welcome back to The Spheres. My name is Dave Vellante and you're watching theCubes continuous coverage of AWS storage day. I'm really excited to bring on Wayne Duso. Wayne is the vice-president of AWS Storage Edge and Data Governance Services. Wayne, two Boston boys got to come to Seattle to see each other. You know. Good to see you, man. >> Good to see you too. >> I mean, I'm not really from Boston. The guys from East Boston give me crap for saying that. [Wayne laughs] That my city, right? You're a city too. >> It's my city as well I'm from Charlestown so right across the ocean. >> Charlestown is actually legit Boston, you know I grew up in a town outside, but that's my city. So all the sports fan. So, hey great keynote today. We're going to unpack the keynote and, and really try to dig into it a little bit. You know, last 18 months has been a pretty bizarre, you know, who could have predicted this. We were just talking to my line about, you know, some of the permanent changes and, and even now it's like day to day, you're trying to figure out, okay, you know, what's next, you know, our business, your business. But, but clearly this has been an interesting time to say the least and the tailwind for the Cloud, but let's face it. How are customers responding? How are they changing their strategies as a result? >> Yeah. Well, first off, let me say it's good to see you. It's been years since we've been in chairs across from one another. >> Yeah. A couple of years ago in Boston, >> A couple of years ago in Boston. I'm glad to see you're doing well. >> Yeah. Thanks. You too. >> You look great. (Wayne Laughs) >> We get the Sox going. >> We'll be all set. >> Mm Dave you know, the last 18 months have been challenging. There's been a lot of change, but it's also been inspiring. What we've seen is our customers engaging the agility of the Cloud and appreciating the cost benefits of the Cloud. You know, during this time we've had to be there for our partners, our clients, our customers, and our people, whether it's work from home, whether it's expanding your capability, because it's surging say a company like zoom, where they're surging and they need more capability. Our cloud capabilities have allowed them to function, grow and thrive. In these challenging times. It's really a privilege that we have the services and we have the capability to enable people to behave and, execute and operate as normally as you possibly can in something that's never happened before in our lifetimes. It's unprecedented. It's a privilege. >> Yeah. I mean, I agree. You think about it. There's a lot of negative narrative, in the press about, about big tech and, and, and, you know, the reality is, is big tech has, has stood and small tech has stepped up big time and we were really think about it, Wayne, where would we be without, without tech? And I know it sounds bizarre, but we're kind of lucky. This pandemic actually occurred when it did, because had it occurred, you know, 10 years ago it would have been a lot tougher. I mean, who knows the state of vaccines, but certainly from a tech standpoint, the Cloud has been a savior. You've mentioned Zoom. I mean, you know, we, productivity continues. So that's been, been pretty key. I want to ask you, in you keynote, you talked about two paths to, to move to the Cloud, you know, Vector one was go and kind of lift and shift if I got it right. And then vector two was modernized first and then go, first of all, did I get that right? And >> Super close and >> So help me course correct. And what are those, what are those two paths mean for customers? How should we think about that? >> Yeah. So we want to make sure that customers can appreciate the value of the Cloud as quickly as they need to. And so there's, there's two paths and with not launches and, we'll talk about them in a minute, like our FSX for NetApp ONTAP, it allows customers to quickly move from like to like, so they can move from on-prem and what they're using in terms of the storage services, the processes they use to administer the data and manage the data straight onto AWS, without any conversion, without any change to their application. So I don't change to anything. So storage administrators can be really confident that they can move. Application Administrators know it will work as well, if not better with the Cloud. So moving onto AWS quickly to value that's one path. Now, once they move on to AWS, some customers will choose to modernize. So they will, they will modernize by containerizing their applications, or they will modernize by moving to server-less using Lambda, right? So that gives them the opportunity at the pace they want as quickly or as cautiously as they need to modernize their application, because they're already executing, they're already operating already getting value. Now within that context, then they can continue that modernization process by integrating with even more capabilities, whether it's ML capabilities or IOT capabilities, depending on their needs. So it's really about speed agility, the ability to innovate, and then the ability to get that flywheel going with cost optimization, feed those savings back into betterment for their customers. >> So how did the launches that you guys have made today and even, even previously, do they map into those two paths? >> Yeah, they do very well. >> How so? Help us understand that. >> So if we look, let's just run down through some of the launches today, >> Great. >> And we can, we can map those two, those two paths. So like we talked about FSX for NetApp ONTAP, or we just like to say FSX for ONTAP because it's so much easier to say. [Dave laughs] >> So FSX for ONTAP is a clear case of move. >> Right >> EBS io2 Block Express for Sand, a clear case of move. It allows customers to quickly move their sand workloads to AWS, with the launch of EBS direct API, supporting 64 terabyte volumes. Now you can snapshot your 64 terabyte volumes on-prem to already be in AWS, and you can restore them to an EBS io2 Block Express volume, allowing you to quickly move an ERP application or an Oracle application. Some enterprise application that requires the speed, the durability and the capability of VBS super quickly. So that's, those are good examples of, of that. In terms of the modernization path, our launch of AWS transfer managed workflows is a good example of that. Manage workflows have been around forever. >> Dave: Yeah. >> And, and customers rely on those workflows to run their business, but they really want to be able to take advantage of cloud capabilities. They want to be able to, for instance, apply ML to those workflows because it really kind of makes sense that their workloads are people related. You can apply artificial intelligence to them, >> Right >> This is an example of a service that allows them to modify those workflows, to modernize them and to build additional value into them. >> Well. I like that example. I got a couple of followup questions, if I may. Sticking on the machine learning and machine intelligence for a minute. That to me is a big one because when I was talking to my line about this is this, it's not just you sticking storage in a bucket anymore, right? You're invoking other services: machine intelligence, machine learning, might be database services, whatever it is, you know, streaming services. And it's a service, you know, there it is. It's not a real complicated integration. So that to me is big. I want to ask you about the block side of things >> Wayne: Sure >> You built in your day, a lot of boxes. >> Wayne: I've built a lot of boxes. >> And you know, the Sand space really well. >> Yeah. >> And you know, a lot of people probably more than I do storage admins that say you're not touching my Sand, right? And they just build a brick wall around it. Okay. And now eventually it ages out. And I think, you know, that whole cumbersome model it's understood, but nonetheless, their workloads and our apps are running on that. How do you see that movement from those and they're the toughest ones to move. The Oracle, the SAP they're really, you know, mission critical Microsoft apps, the database apps, hardcore stuff. How do you see that moving into the Cloud? Give us a sense as to what customers are telling you. >> Storage administrators have a hard job >> Dave: Yeah >> And trying to navigate how they move from on-prem to in Cloud is challenging. So we listened to the storage administrators, even when they tell us, No. we want to understand why no. And when you look at EBS io2 Block Express, this is in part our initial response to moving their saying into the Cloud super easily. Right? Because what do they need? They need performance. They need their ability. They need availability. They need the services to be able to snap and to be able to replicate their Capa- their storage. They need to know that they can move their applications without having to redo all they know to re-plan all they work on each and every day. They want to be able to move quickly and confidently. EBS io2 Block Express is the beginning of that. They can move confidently to sand in the Cloud using EBS. >> Well, so why do they say 'no'? Is it just like the inherent fear? Like a lawyer would say, don't do that, you know, don't or is it just, is it, is it a technical issue? Is it a cultural issue? And what are you seeing there? >> It's a cultural issue. It's a mindset issue, but it's a responsibility. I mean, these folks are responsible for the, one of the most important assets that you have. Most important asset for any company is people. Second most important asset is data. These folks are responsible for a very important asset. And if they don't get it right, if they don't get security, right. They don't get performance right. They don't get durability right. They don't get availability right. It's on them. So it's on us to make sure they're okay. >> Do you see it similar to the security discussion? Because early on, I was just talking to Sandy Carter about this and we were saying, you remember the CIA deal? Right? So I remember talking to the financial services people said, we'll never put any data in the Cloud. Okay they got to be one of your biggest industries, if not your biggest, you know customer base today. But there was fear and, and the CIA deal changed that. They're like, wow CIA is going to the Cloud They're really security conscious. And that was an example of maybe public sector informing commercial. Do you see it as similar? I mean there's obviously differences, but is it a sort of similar dynamic? >> I do. I do. You know, all of these ilities right. Whether it's, you know, durability, availability, security, we'll put ility at the end of that somehow. All of these are not jargon words. They mean something to each persona, to each customer. So we have to make sure that we address each of them. So like security. And we've been addressing the security concern since the beginning of AWS, because security is job number one. And operational excellence job number two. So, a lot of things we're talking about here is operational excellence, durability, availability, likeness are all operational concerns. And we have to make sure we deliver against those for our customers. >> I get it. I mean, the storage admins job is thankless, but the same time, you know, if your main expertise is managing LUNs, your growth path is limited. So they, they want to transform. They want to modernize their own careers. >> I love that. >> It's true. Right? I mean it's- >> Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, if you're a storage administrator today, understanding the storage portfolio that AWS delivers will allow you, and it will enable you empower you to be a cloud storage administrator. So you have no worry because you're, let's take FSX for ONTAP. You will take the skills that you've developed and honed over years and directly apply them to the workloads that you will bring to the Cloud. Using the same CLIs, The same APIs, the same consoles, the same capabilities. >> Plus you mentioned you guys announced, you talked about AWS backup services today, announced some stuff there. I see security governance, backup, identity access management, and governance. These are all adjacency. So if you're a, if you're a cloud storage administrator, you now are going to expand your scope of operations. You, you know, you're not going to be a security, Wiz overnight by any means, but you're now part of that, that rubric. And you're going to participate in that opportunity and learn some things and advance your career. I want to ask you, before we run out of time, you talked about agility and cost optimization, and it's kind of the yin and the yang of Cloud, if you will. But how are these seemingly conflicting forces in sync in your view. >> Like many things in life, right? [Wayne Laughs] >> We're going to get a little spiritually. >> We might get a little philosophical here. [Dave Laughs] >> You know, cloud announced, we've talked about two paths and in part of the two paths is enabling you to move quickly and be agile in how you move to the Cloud. Once you are on the Cloud, we have the ability through all of the service integrations that we have. In your ability to see exactly what's happening at every moment, to then cost optimize, to modernize, to cost optimize, to improve on the applications and workloads and data sets that you've brought. So this becomes a flywheel cost optimization allows you to reinvest, reinvest, be more agile, more innovative, which again, returns a value to your business and value to your customers. It's a flywheel effect. >> Yeah. It's kind of that gain sharing. Right? >> It is. >> And, you know, it's harder to do that in a, in an on-prem world, which everything is kind of, okay, it's working. Now boom, make it static. Oh, I want to bring in this capability or this, you know, AI. And then there's an integration challenge >> That's true. >> Going on. Not, not that there's, you know, there's differences in, APIs. But that's, to me is the opportunity to build on top of it. I just, again, talking to my line, I remember Andy Jassy saying, Hey, we purposefully have created our services at a really atomic level so that we can get down to the primitives and change as the market changes. To me, that's an opportunity for builders to create abstraction layers on top of that, you know, you've kind of, Amazon has kind of resisted that over the years, but, but almost on purpose. There's some of that now going on specialization and maybe certain industry solutions, but in general, your philosophy is to maintain that agility at the really granular level. >> It is, you know, we go back a long way. And as you said, I've built a lot of boxes and I'm proud of a lot of the boxes I've built, but a box is still a box, right? You have constraints. And when you innovate and build on the Cloud, when you move to the Cloud, you do not have those constraints, right? You have the agility, you can stand up a file system in three seconds, you can grow it and shrink it whenever you want. And you can delete it, get rid of it whenever you want back it up and then delete it. You don't have to worry about your infrastructure. You don't have to worry about is it going to be there in three months? It will be there in three seconds. So the agility of each of these services, the unique elements of all of these services allow you to capitalize on their value, use what you need and stop using it when you don't, and you don't have the same capabilities when you use more traditional products. >> So when you're designing a box, how is your mindset different than when you're designing a service? >> Well. You have physical constraints. You have to worry about the physical resources on that device for the life of that device, which is years. Think about what changes in three or five years. Think about the last two years alone and what's changed. Can you imagine having been constrained by only having boxes available to you during this last two years versus having the Cloud and being able to expand or contract based on your business needs, that would be really tough, right? And it has been tough. And that's why we've seen customers for every industry accelerate their use of the Cloud during these last two years. >> So I get that. So what's your mindset when you're building storage services and data services. >> So. Each of the surfaces that we have in object block file, movement services, data services, each of them provides very specific customer value and each are deeply integrated with the rest of AWS, so that when you need object services, you start using them. The integrations come along with you. When, if you're using traditional block, we talked about EBS io2 Block Express. When you're using file, just the example alone today with ONTAP, you know, you get to use what you need when you need it, and the way that you're used to using it without any concerns. >> (Dave mumbles) So your mindset is how do I exploit all these other services? You're like the chef and these are ingredients that you can tap and give a path to your customers to explore it over time. >> Yeah. Traditionally, for instance, if you were to have a filer, you would run multiple applications on that filer you're worried about. Cause you should, as a storage administrator, will each of those applications have the right amount of resources to run at peak. When you're on the Cloud, each of those applications will just spin up in seconds, their own file system. And those file systems can grow and shrink at whatever, however they need to do so. And you don't have to worry about one application interfering with the other application. It's not your concern anymore. And it's not really that fun to do. Anyway. It's kind of the hard work that nobody really you know, really wants to reward you for. So you can take your time and apply it to more business generate, you know, value for your business. >> That's great. Thank you for that. Okay. I'll I'll give you the last word. Give us the bumper sticker on AWS Storage day. Exciting day. The third AWS storage day. You guys keep getting bigger, raising the bar. >> And we're happy to keep doing it with you. >> Awesome. >> So thank you for flying out from Boston to see me. >> Pleasure, >> As they say. >> So, you know, this is a great opportunity for us to talk to customers, to thank them. It's a privilege to build what we build for customers. You know, our customers are leaders in their organizations and their businesses for their customers. And what we want to do is help them continue to be leaders and help them to continue to build and deliver we're here for them. >> Wayne. It's great to see you again. Thanks so much. >> Thanks. >> Maybe see you back at home. >> All right. Go Sox. All right. Yeah, go Sox. [Wayne Laughs] All right. Thank you for watching everybody. Back to Jenna Canal and Darko in the studio. Its Dave Volante. You're watching theCube. [Outro Music]