>>From around the globe, it's the Cube with digital coverage of IBM, think 2021 brought to you by IBM. >>Welcome to the cubes, digital coverage of IBM Think 2021 fine lisa martin. Next joining me is Leo Lebron's director of global strategic initiatives at Aws. Leo, Welcome to the cube. >>Thank you. >>So, talk to me about AWS and IBM. What's going on there with the relationship? What are some of the things that are significant for both partners? >>Yeah, absolutely. You know, IBM relationship really started with us around 2016, I would say it was a little bit more opportunistic at the time, we knew there was an opportunity to go to market together. We knew there were some great things we could do for our customers, but we haven't quite cracked, cracked the code, so to speak, on, on when and where and why we're going to partner at that point. Um you fast forward into the sort of 2017 to 2019 timeframe, um and we became a lot more intentional about how we're going to go to market where we were going to invest. Areas such as S. A. P, et cetera, were early, want to be identified. Um and I'd say the ball really started rolling sort of in the 2018 time Frank, a combination of a number of different things occurred. Uh You know, the the acquisition of Red Hat obviously, you know, Red Hat is a very significant, was a very significant partner with a W. S prior to the acquisition. Um And so post acquisition, you combine that with ramping up a workforce focused on AWS, combined with a number of different competencies at A W or IBM really invested in around migration as an example or S. A. P. Um and you know, the ball really started to roll quickly. Um after that, you know, I'd say in the last 18 months or so, we've both invested, significant in the relationship expansion around the world really, and in joint resources and capability to make sure that we're going to mark, it's sort of a partnered intentional way rather than sort of opportunistic. Uh >>Oh God, >>yeah, I'd say so far that's that's absolutely been paying off. Um and that we are seeing a number of winds all around the world across a broad set of industries as well as a broad set of technologies. Um so, you know, the strength of IBM consulting services in particular, but also their software, combined with the strength of our platform, is really proven to be successful for our customers. >>So you said started in 2016, really started taking shape in the last couple of years. That redhead acquisition talk to me about what's in this for customers. I imagine customers that are, that are expanding or needing to move workloads into the cloud or maybe more of a hybrid cloud approach. What are some of the big benefits that customers are going to gain from this partnership? >>Yeah, absolutely. Uh, reality is um, IBM has a long and storied history and relationship with their customers, right? Um, They run and manage many of the workloads. Um, they really know the customer's business incredibly well. Um They have domain expertise and industry, um, and then the technology expertise from a professional services perspective to really help navigate the waters and and determine what the right strategy is around moving to the cloud, right? You combine that with the depth and breadth of the skills and capabilities and services the WS provides. Um and the fact that IBM has invested significantly in making sure their professional services are deeply steeped in our technology and capabilities. Um, it's a great combination of really understanding the customer's needs plus the art of the possible honestly, when it comes to technology that we provide, really can accelerate both and mitigate risk when it comes to move into the club, >>that risk mitigation is key. So you guys, recently a W has recently launched, I'm gonna get this right red hat, open shift service on AWS or Rosa. Can you talk to me a little bit about rosa? >>Yeah, so um Red Hat obviously very well known and ultimately adopted within the enterprise. Um, we have built a fully managed service around red hat on AWS. Um, what that means is um, you'll have access to essentially the capabilities that that red hat would normally provide, but all containerized within a solution that allows you to have access to AWS services, right. Um, the other benefit here is normally you would get sort of a multi vendors with invoicing and cost model right? Where you get built from red hat get built from amazon, you get built from IBM um, in this case it's it's essentially a holistic service in which there is a single sort of invoicing and vendor relationship. Right? Um, so it's a combination of capabilities that normally would be provided the red hat combined with access to cloud and all the interfaces and capabilities around um, open shift etcetera that you could do their um, plus a more interesting and beneficial commercial model. >>So streamlined pricing model, streamlined operating model for customers. Talk to me about some of the customers that have adopted it. Give me a look into some of the industry's where you've seen good adoption and some of the results that they're gaining so far. >>Yeah, one second. Sorry. It's like insanely love uh worries. >>Let's just take it, let's just take a >>pause. Like we can >>just we can just so yeah, we'll go right as if lisa lisa just finish the question. Um so just take a breather. Yeah, as long as it as it needs. Um and then whenever you're ready, whenever that's that's died down, just just give it a beat, give it like a second and then just write as if she >>just yeah. >>Oh cut it out as if nothing happened. >>Give me >>two minutes. Mhm. >>So actually on your question, I know the answer from things that I've done recently, but was there an official answer Teresa, I'm supposed to give them the >>No, not >>really. I mean, I think what you're talking about on Red Hat specifically >>right earlier. >>No, I mean there's a product page and stuff, it's really about just the >>the >>ability of customers to be able to run those solutions on the AWS console is really the gist of it and then it's fully integrated. >>Not sure advantage of the examples I know of are publicly referenced. >>That's okay. You could just say customer in X y z industry. That's totally fair. Not to worry about that. Yeah, >>I don't know if uh, so rosa, lisa rosa was just launched in March and so it's brand new. So I don't know, I'm the customer stories yet, >>so >>that's why I don't have them listed for leo >>that's fine. That's totally fine. Maybe we can talk about, you know, since the launch was just around the corner, some of the things that have been going on the momentum interest from customers questions conversations, you mean more like that as you're launching the GTM >>Yeah, and there's certainly a couple of industries that they have targeted. So as well as a couple of customers. >>Yeah, thank you >>lisa. Of course. I think they went around the corner. >>All right, let me know and I'll re ask the question. I'll tweak it a little >>bit. Alright, >>so talk to me about Rosa just launched very recently. Talked to me about customer interest adoption. Maybe some of the industry's in particular if you're seeing any industry that's kind of really leading edge here and taking advantage of this new manage service. >>Yeah. So no big surprise, right. The existing customer base that currently uses red at Lenox and some of the options and open shift etcetera that are out today are then the right customers to potentially look at this when it comes to moving forward. Um, you know, industry wise, certainly there are areas in financial services, banking, insurance, um, et cetera. We're also seeing some around manufacturing a little a little less so, but some in media and telco as well. Um, So it's, it's a broad swath of the applicability of red hat and open shift is somewhat universal, but the early customer base is larger than sort of in those three areas. >>What I'm curious what the key target audiences are these Red Hat customers are these AWS customers? IBM all three. >>Yeah. I mean there isn't necessarily the perfect customer that we're not necessarily looking for as much as um if there are existing customers that are currently using Lennox for using Red Hat. Um, if there are someone who, a customer who currently has a relationship with either a W. S. Or IBM, um, there's an opportunity to essentially look at it from any of the angles if you're already on cloud or you've already experienced AWS in some shape or form, there's an opportunity to potentially to leverage rosa to further expand that capability and also have some more flexibility, so to speak. Um if you're already using IBM as a professional services provider and advisory firm, then they absolutely have the expertise and understanding of this product set to help you understand how it could be best leverage. Right? So you can kind of look at it from either the dimensions. Um if it's a customer that's completely new to all of us, then we're happy to talk to you. But um, it's uh, it's something that we'll definitely take a little bit more explanation to understand or why why you should or shouldn't consider this multi cloud open shift. Absolution >>got it. Let's shift gears a bit and talk about ASAP when we think about customers looking to migrate ASAP workloads to the cloud, looking at the right cloud provider providers and those are really big challenging strategic decisions for leadership to make. Talk to me about why when you're in those conversations, AWS is the best choice. >>Absolutely. I mean, really AWS and say with S A P N with many of our services is really looking to give all the options that you could conceivably need or want in order to engage in cloud migration and transformation. Um, press safety specifically right, There are a number of different options, right? You could go for a lift and shift or upgrade from many database. Too sweet on safety hana. Um, could potentially look to modernize and leverage cloud services, post post migration as well as the sort of final Pinnacle of that is a complete transformation to S four, S 4 Hana as far as why AWS specifically beyond just choice. Um, You know, from a from a cost perspective, uh it's a pretty, pretty compelling and we have some pretty compelling business and use cases around ultimately the cost savings that come when, when you move from an on premise S A. P implementation to cloud. Beyond that, usually the cloud migration itself as an opportunity to uh condense or reduce the number of instances you're paying for from an S A S a P perspective, which then further reduces cost um from a reliability perspective, you know, AWS is is the world's most secure, extensive, reliable part infrastructure, right? Um, any of the instances that you put on AWS are uh, instantly and say fairly instantly provision in such a way that they're they are provided across multiple what we call availability zones, um, which is giving you for the resiliency and the stability that really no other cloud broke Right. Um On the security front, I mean, this is really a unique position in that AWS plus IBM and the security, the depth and security services, you know, numerous years of professional services work um that IBM has done the security space um you know, they have roughly 8000 or so cybersecurity experts with an IBM so the combination of their expertise and security plus the security of our platform um is a great combination. Um I'd say the final one is around performance. Right. AWS offers many more cloud native options around certified ASAP instances specifically all the way from 256 gigabyte option all the way up to 24 terabytes, which is the largest of its kind. Um and as as those who have implemented ASAP No, it's a very resource intensive so having the ability to do that from a performance perspective is is a key differentiator for sure. >>Talk to me from your opinion about why IBM for S. A. P on AWS, why should customers go that direction for their projects? >>Yeah. You know, ASAP has, sorry, safety, IBM has over 40 years of experience in implementing ASAP for their customers. Right. They've done I think it's over 6000 S. A. P migrations, uh 40,000 global S A. P consultants around the world. Right. So from a capability and depth of experience, uh yeah, there's a lot of nuance to doing a safety implantation, particularly one that's been moving from on prem to the cloud. Um you know, they've got they've got the experience right beyond that, they have industry specific solutions that are pre configured. So I think that is 12 industry specific industry solutions we configured for S. A. P. It allows, you know, roughly 20-30 acceleration when it comes to implementation of platform. So um combination of just depth of experience, death of capability combined with these solutions to accelerate are all key key reasons for sure. >>The acceleration yet you bring up, sorry, is interesting because we saw in the last year the acceleration of digital transformation projects and businesses needing to pivot again and again and again to figure out how to survive and be successful in this very dynamic market in which we're still living anything industry. Why is it specific that you saw that was really driving the acceleration and the use cases for Rosa in the last year? Yeah, >>yeah. So you ASAP we saw an interesting trend as a result of what everyone's been experiencing in the last year with Covid etcetera. Um you know, many organizations postponed large european implementations and large as a few migrations because of what you just said, right, they weren't entirely sure um what would need to be done in order to survive either competitive threats or more? Just the global threats that are occurring. Um so what we saw was really none of, none of the transformations went away. They were put on hold for a period of time, let's say 6-9 months ago, maybe even a year ago almost um in lieu of I would say more um top line revenue generating or innovative type solutions that maybe we're focused specifically at, you know, the changing dynamic with with Covid. Um Since then we've seen a combination of those new ideas, right? Combination of the new innovation around health care of course, but also public sector and um you know, a lower unemployment and you know, the engagement there, we sent a combination of those new ideas and new innovations with the original goal of optimizing transforming ASAP, europe et cetera, And then combining the two to allow access to the data right that sits inside the S. A. P. Implementation ASAP, Combined the data asap with all these new innovations and then ultimately use that to sort of capitalize on what the future business is going to be. Um that's been huge. It's been very interesting to see some organizations completely changed their business model over the course of the last 12 months um in ways they probably had never intended you before. Right? But it's it's absolutely become an opportunity, you know, time with a lot of challenges. >>I agree there are silver linings and we've seen a lot of those interesting opportunities to your point and businesses probably would never have come up with had there not been a forcing function like we've been living with Julio. Thank you for joining me today. Talking to me about what's going on with I. B. M. And A W. S will be excited to follow. What happens with Rosa as a, uh, continues to roll out and we appreciate you joining us on the program. >>Absolutely. Thank you for time. >>Pearly Lebron chime lisa martin. You're watching the cubes digital coverage of IBM think 2021. Mhm.