[Music] is an open source first company right and we've been around for 20 years and we're pretty amazing at being good at open source giving back to the community building software with people and sharing it back to the community the cubism is an amazing kind of community outreach show and it's really great to be able to communicate and talk to the right people working with the cube has been incredible we do have a couple people that have been on the show a lot and like been able to do that and i think you're very friendly um and yeah just just have a good community around you i've worked for microsoft for a really long time and this is my first reinvent and it's it feels a little odd to be here for a non-microsoft event um and odd and exciting in a way um we are so redhead is partnering with both aws azure as well as gcp ibm and we we are working across different clouds partnering with a lot of cloud providers and i think this is a very interesting new relationship that we have that is new to me compared to being very committed to one single vendor one single line of business like one single operating system and stuff like that being able to partner with different people across the industry and board can build stuff together for the customers one word community

if Studios in Palo Alto in Boston connecting with thought leaders all around the world this is a cute conversation hi I'm Stu minuteman and welcome to a special cube conversation we've been talking to leaders around the industry about how they are helping their organizations and their customers in these challenging time with Kovac 19 really happy to bring back to the program one of our cube alumni he also has a new title Paul Cormier is now the president and CEO of Red Hat Paul it is great to see you we live geographically not too far apart normally we would be getting together person for summit of course that event happening digitally but thanks so much for joining us all right so Paul you have you know storied history at Red Hat you know I've sat through many keynotes where you walk through the product in portfolio looked at the acquisitions looked at the strategic direction moves taking the new job as CEO is a big move in regular times of course we're not in regular times we're in rather unique times here so let's start there what does it mean about coming into this new role in the times that we are facing you know you know as I see it considering the times here I think it's probably one of the biggest decisions I have made in my career to take on this new job only because don't as you know Stu talked a lot I've been here from certainly the beginning of our move to the enterprise in 19 years I was played 120 or so and and I think I actually think that we brought such a big value our customers I think that customers actually going to see even more value as we come out of this because than they have in the past for one thing with the combination of IBM were able to reach a wider set of customers out there if we can bring into the Linux world where all the innovations happening so I think I think our customers we've treated this our product line is an enterprise-grade product line since the beginning since day one we're literally helping our customers eat their businesses running at this point on our product lines because of you know everything we've done the victim enterprise-class you know so Paul some previous you know challenges in my my career you talk about whether financial you know whether it is natural disasters or 9/11 you know the technical industry needs to kind of rally together but you know one of the things that is different about this is the impact that has on every employee I wasn't surprised to see that the letter that you sent out to all of the associates was you know posted on the Red Hat site it didn't need to be leaked or anything like that so you know the transparency always is appreciated but bring us inside a little bit the organization you know how are you you know helping your employees and making sure that they can deal with all the personal things that they need to deal with while still being there for your customers your I mean well first of all first of all one of the things is you know we're sort of used to working remotely when the need arises even full-time for that case a big percentage of our associates are work remotely 1% of the time we've always had the philosophy in that we especially in engineering where we go after the best possible talent and the unique part of being 100 percent open-source focus is that our engineers know the other engineers that are working in our communities whether they know them better met them face to face they certainly know them very well on a professional level so a lot of our people were used to working remotely the other thing the other thing is most of Red Hat is type A personality type people so that's that's a good thing on some days and may be a tough thing on other days but but what that means is everybody works from home at some period whether it's you know they go to the office all day and wake up at midnight and do some more or that's Saturday or Sunday we're all pretty much you know set up to do that so our IT department has been you know they've been fabulous through this you know we've had you know a gazillion more hours of both VPN and video hours and it's just all work but they've had a great test bed for all these years so from from that standpoint from that technical standpoint worked very well from from the employee standpoint we've really we've really picked up the video All Hands videoconferencing from once a quarter every two weeks and so you know I had an All Hands meeting two days ago three days ago when I was announced on my new role and I committed to them we're gonna we're gonna have it all hands every two weeks come in talk we'll give you the updates etc so I think that's one thing you can't over communicate that I like this and I think the third thing that my I guess that's to say my former products for now but you know I still I still love those guys buying my form proved the products group they actually had a very great idea they're holding virtual office hours for their for their colleagues in the field once a week and we're actually holding once in the morning once later at night for the people in asia-pacific actual hours with a product managers in the engineers except for getting on videoconference to integrate and in talk with the folks out in the field about what we're doing in the products and in what's going on and what's upcoming and hear their issues as well I think this serves as two things the first thing that serves a certainly it keeps people engaged but secondly you know our people love the technology and so to some extent with everything going on around kovin and how serious it is in every country it almost gives our our people almost an escape from that to really spend an hour or two a day on this and just really have conversations with each other about the business and the products and the technology so that's become a really big hit inside as well yeah you know definitely there are some things that just get amplified you talked about you know we're used to being able to be on or join meetings you know regardless of the time of day amateur your team plenty of blue jeans and zoom meetings before this but it has taken a slightly different tone now with you know you've now got everybody at home you know and managing you know other personal relationships and things that are happening on the outside you you are still holding red hat summit at the end of April you think there's there's a real strong you know push from your team to you know balance and make sure that you're there for your customers but it's it's not going to be as much of the hoopla there's not that you know the slag and the announcements that are going on why is it important to still bring the community together and you know meet with your partners and customers you know rather than push it off to later this year you know it's a great question you know I said anyone know that when I stand up on stage for my keynote at the summit every year even though I'm so many year I don't know me son it's 1314 something like that even when even it's such a rush because we really do stand there you know Jim talked about this on our internal handoff where he said you know remember Paul and I on a ballroom with one of the first summits at some hotel we look behind the curtain and I said to him there's 300 people out there and you know last year in Boston I looked out and said wow there's 10,000 people here it's amazing so it really started as a as a way to really talk to an interact with both our customers and our community as well but it turned into a celebration and not just a celebration of internal RedHat people a celebration of the whole ecosystem and partners and customers and upstream people of how far open-source and linux has come and we didn't think that celebration part this year was really appropriate considering where we were but but we all still have a job to do we're all doing him remotely and as I said we're running made our customers business so we felt it was really important to put this out there to have our customers understand where we're going in the coming year the new some of the new products that we have coming and how we can help them and so that's really more of the tone this year and we feel that still important we all have a big job right now in coming out of this we're even going to have bigger jobs and how we re-entry into this and balance that so that's really the focus this year how we can continue to help with the technology we brought to the enterprise for the last 19 years yeah Paul the last question I have for you you know I think back to summit last year Satya Nadella was on stage Jenny Jenny Rometty was up on stage of course Red Hat you know tightly tied into you know abroad community and ecosystem network out there so as the leader of Red Hat you know how are you you know in contact and working with you know the communities and the partner ecosystem to both manage through and be ready for the other side of today I mean in one regard especially with many it's almost more at this point I mean that the partners in the ecosystems are really important many of the partners especially the smaller partners they look to us for leadership so so we still have communication with them and partly the summit is is for them as well well some of the larger partners like that you mentioned Microsoft a certainly IBM and an Amazon and Google and others we actually communicate almost more now that we're all working from home because as I said earlier the same goes outside as it does in inside you just can't and over communicate this environment and you know as you know sue the tech industry looks like this giant industry but it really is kind of a small industry and a lot of us know each other from for many years and so that communication is going on we're comparing notes actually in many cases we're comparing notes maybe even more than we might have in the past well no what are you guys doing at your company the plan for this is and I've actually seen some of the partners who focus on proprietary technologies even become a more bit more open on those discussions now so I think maybe that could be if there's any good outcome of this that could be one of the outcomes that's slightly positive all right well Paul thank you so much for the update congratulations on your new role we absolutely are looking forward to the summit at the end of the month thanks again always great to see you soon thanks very much all right be sure to check out the cube dotnet where you can see the the preview of Red Hat summit as well as the guests that we will have there we will have Paul Stephanie Matt Hicks lots of the Red Hat executives their customers and partners I'm Stu minimun and thank you for watching the cube [Music]

>>mhm Yes. Welcome back to the cubes coverage of red hat summit 2021 virtual john for your host of the cube paul. Comey who's here is the president and Ceo of red hat cube alumni paul always great to have you on the leader of red hat now President and Ceo for a year I think about a year now we're looking at under your belt now part of IBM Great to see you. >>You too nice to see you again john. >>So we've talked many times on the Cuban now. It's kind of playing out in real time. The software world with open source has gone mainstream. The conversation was moved to the cloud. Okay. People move to the cloud. Cloud native emerges devil has been around for a while. But now the conversation is cloud for the enterprise that uh, the enterprises, it's a tough world. You gotta, it's complicated is a lot of legacies, a lot of value and you want the new stuff. This is what the conversation is now. It's shifted to I got cloud, it's hybrid. What's your reaction to that? >>Well, you know, it really is, as you say, it's complicated but it's evolving and really, really fast. I mean, you know, I think you remember we've been here a lot. You first remember first software is eating the world and open source software is eating the world and in every every company is becoming a software company. All true. But that evolution continues today with the proliferation of hybrid cloud environments that it encompasses everything from data centers to public cloud services to And even now we'll talk about two for far flung edge deployments. That's all now part of the cloud. I mean, this is all what makes up hybrid. I like to always say that Hybrid really is the new data centers but now see IOS and I thi leaders, they need to reconsider what their roles, what their role here is and the way we look at it as every C I O now needs to be a cloud operator because because Hybrid is what their environment is now today, that used to be all in their data center. So, so but one of the things that really makes a choice even more important and its leaders, they need to address address specific needs, um not only to the organization, but even as they change and evolve in this because it really is a dynamic environment, I mean think about it and just mentioned edge and how how important that is to see IOS, we weren't even talking about that two years ago, so, so it's not a single answer here, right? Um and and you know, and there as there wasn't a single answer when it was all in one building or in one data center, but now it's even it's even more complex. So, so we need to enable really a new wave of cloud operators here with technologies that can be deployed as cloud services as well as on premises. We'll talk more about this too, but and we'll talk about this at the summit. We talked about the summit. Cloud services become really important, especially managed services, for example, because, um because we're so complex, Hybrid brings so much power, but it is complex. You know, see I need help with this, they need help managing this now. And so that's really where a lot of our focus is today. >>It's interesting you say there's no single answer. I would agree with you because it's now you can actually do a lot more customization with cloud and Hybrid. I think there's a general sentiment and directionally correct answer uh in the industry is that hybrid is operating model right? And I think you guys are have a whole division of SRS google talks about this all the time and their cloud site reliability engineers. And I think you're seeing that in educational institutions which we'll talk about. But I think this idea of cloud scale as the new I. T. And you mentioned hybrids, the new data center. You know, I don't I don't want to offend my I. T. Friends out there but they're kind of all realizing it to that if they don't understand how to operate cloud scale they'll be irrelevant and they're and they understand that their jobs are not just provisioning storage, networking and servers. Those are now involved in a hybrid architecture. And by the way, there is no one recipe, it's dependent. Each enterprise can have its own set of architecture based on their workloads again. So I buy that no single answer, but there is hybrid and I think it's pretty well understood. I mean, do you agree with that? >>I absolutely agree with that. But let's take a look at this, unpack it a little bit and take a look at the building blocks a bit. Right. Um, you know, we talked about open sources, what's driving all of this now and and everything we're talking about here is built in and around Lennox and it was only possible because Lennox was so open, so available and became so powerful, that's now been the platform that all this new innovation is built around. I mean, I oftentimes saying it's true the cloud just wouldn't be here had Lennox not only made its way in the open source development environment, but made its way into the enterprise to enable it to companies like us that make it enterprise ready, secure etcetera. So I think that's really an important thing to understand here. So when you talk about skills that the Ceos need certainly SRE skills, operation skills etcetera, but they also need Lennox skills and even open source skills. So so I think I think that's important, everything that's coming down the road and in in this space in um in his open source based and built in and around Lennox things like ai quantum computing, autonomous vehicles um IOT in and out to the edge all built on a foundation of Lennox and open source. So we see it in the enterprise everywhere now. I mean a survey where you know we did a survey out there and looking at the survey of C I O s out there, open is predominant out there, Lennox is predominant out there in hybrid is predominant and growing in a pretty big clip every year. >>You know, paul, I want to get your reaction to something because this may be kind of a dot connecting moment for me because I want to get your thoughts on this because it's a it's a pattern I'm seeing emerging now multiple times and usually I thought this was kind of a one off, but I'm starting to see it. So I'm going to get your thoughts on this. You guys have been super successful with open source in the enterprise, Super successful over decades, building a community and an ecosystem now with open source with with cloud Native, specifically we're seeing end users participating more in the, in the contribution starts out with the hyper scale ear's but now you're seeing kind of, I would call general purpose mainstream enterprises contributing projects, not necessarily their expertise, but they've been participating in taking the goodness of open source and bringing that into the into the enterprise. And I'll see you relying on you guys as well. But now I'm starting to see the pattern where people are relying on you to bring your community to them and they merge their communities with you guys and being kind of a steward there, is that a pattern? Do you see that evolving? Because we've heard that on multiple interviews on the cube where we've heard end users say we love the red hat ecosystem and and that seems to be more and more about they want to be building their ecosystem. So you did it for yourselves, you did it for the industry. Now, enterprises want this service is this is this is a pattern. And what's your reaction to that? >>It actually is a pattern because it's actually one of the reasons why innovation is moving so quickly right now. As I just said, you know, you know, this whole area here in infrastructure and cloud and development environments, Hybrid included. It's all built in and around, it's all built in and around Lennox. And in the past, what's happening and driven by open source development in the past? What happened? Look at the old fashioned way, right, where a company like us would be in a company, software company, not like us, but any old software company would be, you know, in their stovepipe, talking to their customers, getting their requirements and then bringing those requirements back from the customer base and then trying to work that into their products over time, get that back out to the customer to test it and try it, see it as it works. That's probably a five year, there's probably a five year journey, uh, for big, big requirements for big change requirements you look at now with, with actually end users now participating in upstream development, they're building their requirements into that upstream, which is our development environment. And actually that's what feeds our products. And so we've cut out the middleman, if you will completely in there now when we're building those requirements into our future future, R and D work in the upstream and then we bring that down into a product back into their enterprise for them to use in production. So it cuts out years of time for that innovation to get from concept to building to product, rising to production. And, and I think, you know, john, that's one of the big reasons why that customer base participating is one of the big reason why we're seeing innovation move like we've never seen it before in the enterprise, which in the old days that was a stodgy place where they didn't want to move very quickly. >>Yeah. And the values there, I mean I think it's clear what the pandemic we get to this towards the the last last talking track here. But with the pandemic I think it's pretty clear what the value is and the speed to capture opportunities and growth. I think enterprises are realizing that I think the power of the ecosystem is a modern error kind of phenomenon that is now kind of showing its its value and clearly in the market. And I think people who harness communities and ecosystems not try to fork them but connect them and and intersect them and kind of played well together. So again this is an open source concept kind of re imagined so we'll keep an eye on that. So, um, I want to get to your comment in the kino you mentioned at the top here every C I. O. It has to be a cloud operator. You know, that reminds me of all the start ups and all the positioning statements. Every company needs to be a software company. Every company needs to be a media company. Every company needs to be a cloud operator. So I love that. What does it mean? Because I could say, hey paul, I have a cloud, I'm working on amazon Or is that it? Or wait a minute as yours got, I got 365 over here and I'm using big query over here. I might use oracle over here. I mean all these multi cloud conversations. So it's confusing. >>Yeah. Tell me what, you know, if you look at, if you look at it, we were really one of the first ones to really build around this hybrid, this hybrid concept. And the reason why we were one of the first ones is because what amazon hit the world 12 or 13 years ago or something like that, They were the first major cloud and at the time that the narrative was that, you know, every application was going to move to the cloud tomorrow. Right well, because as I said earlier, everything is built in and in and around open source. And legs were very involved with our customers as they tried to move those first applications to the cloud. So certainly is a lot of value and moving to the cloud. But our customers quickly realized with us helping them, quickly realized that you know what, this is great. But not every application suited for the cloud, um for any cloud, but also I may want to run multiple clouds because another cloud provider over here might have a better service than this particular service over here, vice versa. And so we were in the middle of that. So one of the decisions we made seven or eight years ago, everything we did in that last seven or eight years around the portfolio, whether it was building products, m and A, requiring new companies etcetera, was built around that hybrid portfolio. What that means is a common platform that sits both on premise and bare metal machines. Virtual machines, private clouds on premise multiple clouds across out in the enterprise, that common platform so that developers, operators and the security people have that common platform to build with because just like in Lenox, even though they are all derived from open source upstream, they're all different, they all make different choices and how they're going to configure themselves. So, so that's important. So now we're out there with these multiple clouds. One of our surveys we see our Ceo is telling us now that You're using on the average I think six Clouds today and they expect that to go 8-10 over the next 3-5 years. So how are they going to manage that? How are they going to secure that? How are their operations people going to operate with that? That's all the things that we've been working on over the last number of years. So from that common platform, which is sort of the basis which is open shift to underneath it, which is the Linux operating system, which is well that spans all those footprints that I talked about. And then also you look at one of the latest trends is as well as manage services because what customers are now telling us is okay I got this environment that this hybrid is now my data center. It means I have to worry about these apps all in different footprints. Um I want to the platform to act like a cloud in some cases I don't want to I don't want to even manage it. I want you to manage it for me because for many reasons I want great up time. I might not have the right skill sets in my organization and so I want you to manage it. And so that's where we develop managed services and that's where we have set a large group today large SRE group that's providing those managed services no matter where our platform runs for our customers. Also, what I talked about in my keynote today is that to support that thought process is that we're doing a lot of research in this and so, you know, in a typical computer science research world, you know, of the past, you might really be into the into the real computer science of Research. We with the consortium around mass Open cloud with Boston University, MIT, Harvard Northeastern with this consortium. We're running mass Open cloud on all Red Hat with the collaboration of these universities and we're really focusing on the sorry aspect of it. What do we need to manage it? What do we need around automation to manage it? What do we need around ai to manage it? What do we need for tools to manage it? And and that's really goes down to what I fully briefly said in the beginning, is that every C I O N I T uh executive now has to be their own cloud operator because they are effectively stitching all these disparate clouds together. So that's where a big part of our focus takes us all the way from, You know, upstream development to product to the research we're doing for the next 3-5 plus years. >>You know, I gotta say the hybrid cloud is a new data center which is implying I T in the cloud operators with C X O S and C IOS is interesting because it's validated by Mckinsey's recent report that came out that said there's a trillion dollars of untapped value in one retrofitting existing infrastructure and operations and to net new operate use cases that the cloud enables. So there's clearly not two categories of value proposition that businesses are facing. One is, you know, kind of take care of the existing and then also bring in the new that cloud enables. So, you know, I think that's really key and that will drive the business leaders to foresight, if you will to be agile and adaptive to that. So so totally agree on that. I love this open cloud initiative, you mentioned the mass open cloud which I know is kind of like this beanpot for techies, um people who know what that means, uh it's in the boston area these institutions um this is gonna be a training and an opportunity to train the next generation and if you take it to the next level cybersecurity is also in this kind of net new novelty, interdisciplinary components. So you got engineering which is like devops engineering and then Systems Engineering and Computer Science intersecting together with kind of this data discipline. So it hits cybersecurity which is a board level conversation, it hits the new business model opportunities which is a driver, this is new, this is there's no pre existing curriculum. What how do you explain that to heads of the departments and the deans of these institutions saying, you know, it's an engineering thing. No, it's computer science thing. No, it's a it's a business school thing with data science. What's your what's your conversation with folks in the industry when you say this is a different thing? >>Uh you know, the university, you know, the university is getting, it was actually one of the one of the first things this is you know what you'll see. You know, I talked to uh dr bob Brown from President bu earlier in an interview and and this is what we imagined with them early on and even they brought those disciplines together now in in in what they call a harry institute, where to bring data, computer science engineering as you say. And now even operations, it's almost like, you know, systems engineering on steroids, it's a really big spanning system. And so so the universities are starting understand that's why these universities in the consortium, that's why we're working here. But also, you know, the industry's kind of learning it the hard way because now that they get some of their developers starting to move some of their application developments out into one, maybe two clouds and having the now they have to figure out how they're going to do all those things that we talked about, develop, secure operated. So they're they're learning the hard way that this is the new discipline because that's reality. I also think that, you know, as I said, like anything in tech, we always say this is going to happen tomorrow. I also think, like I said, when when cloud first came came out, everybody saying, I'm moving every app to the cloud tomorrow. We even had customers that bought into that said we're moving going full board but they realized once they get into it it wasn't practical. Don't take me wrong. Cloud brings a ton of value here but from a practical perspective it's going to be some apps and across many clouds and and so now they're having to deal with the I. T. Execs and the C. I. Was having to deal with it. So they're learning really fast because of the reality that they have to deal with. Now having said all that to it also brings up why managed services you're seeing so popular right now because as that's moving so fast they just don't have the skills necessary in many cases to really operate and run in this in this type of environment. It brings so much power but the skills aren't necessarily there in the industry. So that now you see the connection between the industry where we sit and even the university now looking at this whole big problem as as you put said, john, actually a new discipline, >>I think, I think, and I think one final leg of a three legged stool is at the business schools because when you think about systems programming, you mentioned that and you know, I love to go back in history and look at the history of operating systems. And you know, paul, we've talked us in the past and you guys know a lot about operating systems from a technology standpoint, it's not just about a productivity suite for a user or a department with the system, it's a company that needs to be programmed. So when people want to globally operate their business, that software defined this isn't now and this is now happening, right? So this the new leaders in these companies that want to run these global companies that scale operate them, just like operating the business not necessary. Operating a tech or shiny new toy, have to build the operating system for the business. To me, I think that's where I see IBM looking at cloud differently and saying, hey, this is an operating system under the covers for the business. The applications are multi fold from, you know, an application for productivity to an edge device, industrial or consumer user work at home. I mean it's a plethora of applications. What's your reaction to that? And you you see the same thing? >>I mean frankly, I think this is an area that a lot of the infrastructure players missed in the past. And I think I think this is what IBM saw with with bringing us in as well. It's all about the application. You know, I said earlier that, you know, we said every every company was a software company is true. And so that means the companies are running their businesses on these applications. So it's all about the app and I think a lot of infrastructure companies miss that. And and so with Hybrid now you have that ability to run the app wherever makes the most sense for for a whole host of reasons. And so now, but now comes the complexity of all of that. I think, I think IBM with bringing us in saw that that Hybrid was maybe as big, if not a bigger opportunity than cloud itself because of of the complexity it's going to bring, the power is going to bring. But also the complexity is gonna bring. I see that's why, you see Arvind, I sort of doubling down the entire IBM company on on hybrid services that are that are going to be really important here, that they provide these applications on top that are going to be really important, but that have to be architected in such a way that they can run in a hybrid environment. And finally there's all the infrastructure and tools and development pieces that we bring to the table. So, So yeah, I think I think are really, really understood that as they made the decision to bring redheaded, >>I talked to a center all the time and they also have this kind of concept of re factoring and reprogramming your business. Uh, it's not, it's a holistic view. This is kind of what's happening. So my final question for you is as as that becomes software enabled and programmed if you will with applications the business with many different subsystems in there. Um a lot of companies now looking at the light at the end of the tunnel with the pandemic and they're seeing vaccines coming out. Some say vaccines will be pretty much everywhere, everyone over 12 by the fall. So we're back to real life. There's gonna be a pullback of some projects on doubling down on others. As you as you mentioned, what are we doing? We're starting to see hybrid as companies come out of the pandemic, they're all jockeying to make sure that they have either done their work to re factor or reposition, reprogrammed their business and be set up for net new opportunities. >>What >>do you see as a growth model or growth opportunities for companies? You want to come out with a growth strategy out of the gate of the pandemic. What's your thoughts? >>Well, I mean, I think you have to plan for companies have to plan for your workforce to be anywhere, but in order to be anywhere in and to be productive, you need you need services like we're on right now for example, but you need the infrastructure to be able to do that. You need you need a way for your customers if you buy the fact that every company is a software company, you're running a business through their applications either way for your customers to be able to interact with you anywhere from where they are anywhere in a real time way. And so I think that's why from our perspective, things like that we're pushing a lot on the edge. Now, that's why you're seeing the hybrid cloud moved all the way out into the edge and you can see it in every vertical, you know, in the telco space. The edge means you gotta do, you have data and compute that needs to be done on the set on the cell tower in the manufacturing world. You have the state and compute that needs to be done on the factory floor, in the retail vertical. We see the edge really being significant in all these verticals, but but that edge is now extends that hybrid data center that we've been talking so much about. So even though you have all these edge devices way out there on the edge, it's a critical part of the business. So you have to have, your developers need need to be able to develop for it, you need to secure it, you need to and you need to operate it and manage it. So now, you know, in a very short period of time, hybrids taken on another dimension, bringing you out to all these points on the edge which is the same but slightly different in every vertical. Now comes complexity and that's why automation is so important because with that power comes complexity but it's going to take automation to keep it all running, >>paul. Great insight. Thanks for coming on the cube. Open innovation out in the open with with you guys again continue. And the focus of the evolution of software and the cloud with enterprise I. T. Clearly a lot of innovation and your contribution to academia and the mass open cloud and all the open cloud initiatives, phenomenal. The world's going. Open source and continues and continues. Doesn't stop. The operating system of businesses is coming and you guys are well positioned. Thanks for coming on. >>Thanks again john. Always a pleasure. >>Okay paul, Cormier, President Ceo of Red Hat here on the Cuban, john for your host. Thanks for watching. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm mm.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) >> Hello, and welcome back to theCUBE's coverage of Red Hat Summit 2021 virtual. I'm John furrier, host of theCUBE We've got a great segment with a customer Roberto Calandrini, Head of Architecture, Digital and AI services for Snam customer need to leak oil and gas and AI services for Snam customer need to leak oil and gas great industrial IOT and digital transformation. Roberto, thank you for coming on the cube and spending the time. >> Hi, John. Good to see you. Thank you for inviting me. >> That's awesome. Before we get started, I love the story and again I think security edge and in, in in disease industry for disruptions is huge story here. But before we get started, talk about Snam. Give me a quick overview of Snam, who you guys are. What's your focus customers you have and your role there. >> Of course. So it was not is one of the major global energy infrastructure company and is managing a international and a national asset specifically and a national asset specifically in the natural gas utility segment. There's what the story Kelly Snam did. And it recently positioned itself as a leader of the energy transition, investing a lot in startups of the energy transition, investing a lot in startups mostly focused on, for example, H2 so hydrogen, these the very recent topic, bio Nathan with numb for environment sustainable mobility, energy efficiency, and reforestation. So we kind of So we kind of expanded our core businesses in terms of positioning ourselves much more within the energy transition segments and still developing a lot, what we used to do in the natural gas, in the natural gas industry. And my role there is, as you said, Head of Architecture And my role there is, as you said, Head of Architecture Digital and AI Services. So I'm basically responsible for managing the entire technology stack of Snam and focusing a lot on developing artificial intelligence services for our business lines. >> That's awesome. Well, thanks for sharing that. Let's talk about the digital transmission you've been rearchitecting. You guys redesign your applications map impacting your architecture from the data center to the edge recently, even the center of that your responsibility for the business. What were the business drivers and objectives for you to reach that transformation goal and target? >> Yeah, thanks for, for the question. So they basically, we were mainly interested in exploiting three main three main objectives with our transformation. The first was very much related to our business strategy. So having a more agile So having a more agile and flexible digital architecture that will still on one one end provide us with the reliability that we need in order to sustain our business critical application. And on the other end, provide the agility And on the other end, provide the agility and flexibility the speed in some sense that our new business line will lead in order to succeed. So let's say speed and agility. The second one was a focus on platformization and servitization of our industry specific application. So what we used to develop, as So what we used to develop, as let's say, very focused full stack application now, thanks to the modern architectures can be developed on top of platforms or using microservices. on top of platforms or using microservices. And that will apart from providing us agility And that will apart from providing us agility and flexibility will give us more alignment will give us more alignment between what we invest. So the cost of our software development efforts So the cost of our software development efforts and the business value we derive and the business value we derive from the software we produce basically. >> John: Can I... >> So I focus on value. >> Can I ask you real quick on the business drivers? Can you talk about the impact of domain expertise? One of the trends we're seeing is you want to scale of cloud and having an architecture that's going to enable value creation and customer value for your customers but in these vertical disruptions these new opportunities in these industries like you're a very specialized industry get natural gas and you still need that domain expertise if you want to tap in and advantage of the AI. >> Absolutely. >> Can you share your vision on how you're doing that and how that relates to the business driver? >> Yeah. So let's say that this is very, very aligned with >> Yeah. So let's say that this is very, very aligned with with our strategy that focuses with our strategy that focuses on platformization servitization. So if you think So if you think about how we can explore the best, the value of our people so our industry specific expertise, there are two main ways. The first is to build from scratch as we used to do The first is to build from scratch as we used to do in the past full stack applications that are really focused on a specific, this specific need of a business line. And so focused on the business side of the industry or we can leverage modern architecture and develop services that serve that specific need. and develop services that serve that specific need. So this will let us basically being able to So this will let us basically being able to So this will let us basically being able to satisfy our internal customer. So our internal clients and the business need and at the same time, being able to use that software so that service for an external customer or potential potentially for, for our peers. So in order to provide value exploiting our business expertise, in order to, for example you cited AI using what we developed as an AI system, for example, for two in order to solve demand for customer problems and provide that same business value for, for for other companies that are are they share our same business need. >> Yeah. It's a data workload. I mean, it's at the end of the day you need the data >> Exactly. >> and that's going to come back. I want to unpack the data workload when we talk about the edge, but real quick, I want to talk about the role red hat played in your journey to execute your architecture and transformation. Can you share how Red Hat helped you in this? >> Sure. So let's say that, you know, >> Sure. So let's say that, you know, it all began in two, 2018. it all began in two, 2018. When we started to set up our cloud readiness map When we started to set up our cloud readiness map in order to assess what we will, we'll be able to transform. in order to assess what we will, we'll be able to transform. So scale lift and shift or refactor of of our application map into a modern architecture application. into a modern architecture application. So this cloud readiness journey started So this cloud readiness journey started with assessing the level of modularity with assessing the level of modularity with assessing the level of modularity in some way of some of our main applications. And what we started to do is to develop the first blueprints in order to start to develop new system in order to start to develop new system and new application on a cloud native framework and new application on a cloud native framework and Red Hat really Apple with this but providing a container orchestration platform OpenShift on which we started to build up our new, our new application, that up our new, our new application, that so the cloud native application by application map so the cloud native application by application map then in 2019, we started to accelerate this then in 2019, we started to accelerate this let's say moving to a CNA environment journey. let's say moving to a CNA environment journey. let's say moving to a CNA environment journey. And we started to move the first 10 to 20% And we started to move the first 10 to 20% of our workload on the platform as a service environment. of our workload on the platform as a service environment. So an OpenShift and this is something that we are still doing while at the same time, developing different project at the same time, developing different project that tries to turn what we used to have developed that tries to turn what we used to have developed as custom application toward platforms. as custom application toward platforms. So we are basically transforming our application map leveraging the power for what regards to the customer application of modern architectures. So microservices bays So microservices bays and the container orchestration platform provided by Red Hat OpenShift. And at the same time the other main technological driver is platform migration. the other main technological driver is platform migration. So with basically trying to leverage, especially for the processes that are already very standardized. for the processes that are already very standardized. So usually corporate processes. So staff SEF function processes what we're doing there is to build on top of very what we're doing there is to build on top of very let's say industry standard platform. I don't want to, to provide you with names but you can imagine most but you can imagine most of them are software as a service platforms. And this is really happiness because we are as a target. And this is really happiness because we are as a target. We are, we have as, as a target for 2022 to basically have the number for 2022 to basically have the number of application with respect to the number of application our application map of 2018. our application map of 2018. >> So big, big step increase in applications. >> Yeah, yeah, yeah >> That's great. That's cool. And then the ecosystem of energy efficiency and aiming for lower carbon emissions that's a goal you guys are helping with. How is Red Hat helping in the ecosystem in your ecosystem? Do you see them going above and beyond? >> You know, the, for what regards to new business lines? I think that the container orchestration platform I think that the container orchestration platform so OpenShift would provide us with the right level so OpenShift would provide us with the right level of flexibility and agility to move of flexibility and agility to move at the speed of those businesses. That is quite different with respect to our classical ones and frequently needs a much higher speed of development. and frequently needs a much higher speed of development. >> Yeah. Awesome. Well, that's great. Great to see that success with Red Hat let's let's shift gears to the topic of the edge. >> Yeah We've been reporting on Silicon angle industrial edge for many years now. And we were calling out the security potential there as risky, obviously it's, it's it's industrial there's you also got generic edge which is consumer edge and everything in between the edge is just part of the network. And you think about this, this is important for you are what are you doing for you are what are you doing with the edge and IOT from a use case standpoint? What have you already done? And what are you planning to deploy soon? Take us through your, your edge IOT use case how it is today and how you see it tomorrow. >> So let's say that Snam has long OT history that basically started that Snam has long OT history that basically started at the very beginning of our SCADA system. So what we have right now is quite complex Brown So what we have right fields situation for what regards edges and gateways fields situation for what regards edges and gateways fields situation for what regards edges and gateways and technical component that resides on, on the field. and technical component that resides on, on the field. So you can, you, you, you must consider that the Italian network is for the modern that the Italian network is for the modern modern 34,000 kilometers and modern 34,000 kilometers and as many different plants, small, medium, and as many different plants, small, medium, and and large plants spread across the country. and large plants spread across the country. And what we are trying to do leveraging also Red Hat technologies among with Red Hat technologies among with with others is trying to get the benefit with others is trying to get the benefit of containers and microservice development. So the benefit coming from cloud native application and getting those to the edge. from cloud native application and getting those to the edge. So the usual problem So the usual problem with OT as historically been a standardization with OT as historically been a standardization so a very heterogeneous number of components Virginia's protocols of components Virginia's protocols in order for them to communicate with the charters and relatively low level of security. with the charters and relatively low level of security. This is, this was mainly due to the segregation principle This is, this was mainly due to the segregation principle physical segregation principle that used to physical segregation principle that used to dominate the OT field with IOT. Of course, as you were saying we are terrifically expanding the attack surface we are terrifically expanding the attack surface from the cybersecurity standpoint, but at the same time that is mainly why we are approaching that is mainly why we are approaching in a very structural way. Our technology stack implementation including security by design in all our architectural blueprints and implementation. And we strongly believe that pushing the capability And we strongly believe that pushing the capability of container orchestration and containerization to the edge and being able to orchestrate that from the cloud or from our data centers will provide us with a very high level of high-quality and flexibility and the capability to exploited best the geographical distribution of the data. to exploited best the geographical distribution of the data. You know, you were saying a center point will be You know, you were saying a center point will be was soaked around data, and it is correct, but it in our specific case, our data basically came from points in our specific case, our data basically came from points in our specific case, our data basically came from points as I was saying, spread it all across the country. So having different data, gravity points enabled So having different data, gravity points enabled by container rise and centrally orchestrated by container rise and centrally orchestrated by container rise and centrally orchestrated environments will enable us to get the best also environments will enable us to get the best also in terms of, from the cybersecurity perspective because what will be acquired on the centralized environment is only exclusively on the centralized environment is only exclusively what is needed at the centralized environment. what is needed at the centralized environment. All the rest on our target architecture will be entirely elaborated on the field, very close to where the data physically on the field, very close to where the data physically and this will be excludable exclusively enabled by by a containerized approach. >> That's awesome. Great, great. A use case there, Roberto, what's next A use case there, Roberto, what's next for your future plans and your technology journey? Obviously AI is going to be very important and data and leveraging that you've got the core cloud data center edge perspective. >> Yeah, of course. Yeah. What, what, what's next? >> What's your future? Let's say, let's say that what we currently implemented is Let's say, let's say that what we currently implemented is and in average cloud environment so we basically have two data center and one cloud tenant, our infrastructure due to, again and one cloud tenant, our infrastructure due to, again and one cloud tenant, our infrastructure due to, again the use of OpenShifts will be easily extensible the use of OpenShifts will be easily extensible the use of OpenShifts will be easily extensible to other potentially to other cloud providers. So we will move, we're evaluating the move to a multicloud So we will move, we're evaluating the move to a multicloud a hybrid multicloud environment. At the same time our main focus right now is to close our IOT foundation. our main focus right now is to close our IOT foundation. And within the IOT foundation I think the main focus right now is on gateways and edges. I think the main focus right now is on gateways and edges. As you were saying, these are quite complex components As you were saying, these are quite complex components and must be greatly evaluated, especially from the cybersecurity standpoint and last from the cybersecurity standpoint and last but not least the data we need to. but not least the data we need to we started our data platform journey and we currently are acquiring data from legacy systems and we currently are acquiring data from legacy systems different kinds of legacy system and SCADA system. What we would like to reach is a complete IOT What we would like to reach is a complete IOT What we would like to reach is a complete IOT acquisition system that will be directly connected to our components, acquiring data on the field. Right now we are in, let's say Right now we are in, let's say in the middle of this digital transformation and we are hemming to close our and we are hemming to close our our journey in the next couple of years. >> That's great, Roberto, great story. Love the conversation. First of all, I love your title Head of Architecture, Digital AI Services. I mean, that speaks to this modern error of, of, of cloud distributed computing. You hit all the hit, all the key things, right? It's an architectural system distributed system. It's a digital business. Now, even though there's physical assets offline, online coming together in a modern way and AI really speaks to the underlying data which is combination of many, many things, you know you're you get all the action there. >> Roberto: Yeah! >> How do you feel? What's your advice to other people in the same boat you're in? >> No, I, I think that, that the interesting part of what we do that the interesting part of what we do at least in, in my specific area, and this is what digital at least in, in my specific area, and this is what digital or sustained for is digital service design. This is something new that is quite uncommon within the utility sector. And it is basically a group of people that apart And it is basically a group of people that apart from being technologists focus a lot on the interaction from being technologists focus a lot on the interaction design of what we are or what we are trying to build design of what we are or what we are trying to build in terms of the technology stack. So these are people that basically try to make the very So these are people that basically try to make the very complex technology stack we talk about in our interview much more simple the, to the final user and think about the level of interaction, complexity about the level of interaction, complexity that all our user will have with our technology stack. Especially when we talk about IOT now, and you start to interact, not just with digital systems, but also with digital or physical systems. with digital or physical systems. So yes, we, we, we have a lot on our plate >> It reminds me of the late eighties, early nineties when open standards really hit the scene and then incubated and then accelerated was seeing that same dynamic happening now with cloud. And you're a pioneer and really appreciate you taking the time to come on The Cube and speak with me about this and share your story. And more importantly than Red Hat success there. 'cause it's Red Hat summit, a story here, Roberto. Thank you very much for sharing your insights and experiences. >> Thank you for your time, John. This has been a pleasure. >> Really appreciate it. Okay. That's Red Hat CUBE coverage here with theCUBE. I'm John furrier. Thanks for watching. (upbeat music)