(upbeat instrumental music) >> Hello, everyone. Welcome to another great CUBE Conversation here in Palo Alto, our CUBE Studio, I'm John Furrier. We've got a great conversation with a friend Saar Gillai CUBE alumni. Saar is an executive, coaching startups, investing, was in Silicon Valley, sees a lot of the landscape, knows networking, knows cloud. Saar, great to see you. Thanks very much. >> It's great to be here again as always. >> Yeah, love having you come in and be an analyst for us and help us squint through some of the big mega trends that we're following. As you know, we believe that cloud is here to stay. And I'm always chirping, certainly online about how Amazon clearly way ahead of Microsoft Google has a great network, and you and I we going to to talk more about that. But the game is just getting started and compute is phase one of the game of cloud. >> Saar: Correct. >> Completely been commoditized it's serverless, a lot of great things are helping developers. This next wave of networking is going to be the next battleground of innovation and certainly transformation. This is your wheelhouse, you've seen this movie, from old school networking to telcos to now, we're in the middle of it. What's your take on networking? Because we're going to be at Cisco Live Barcelona next week. But you have a good view into the overall landscape. Tell us what are you seeing? >> Sure, no, I mean, I think you said it right. I mean, basically if you look at what happened in computing in the last decade plus or minus in terms of the the advent of the public cloud and the cloud model and automation, even if you're using private cloud, you know, that is all going to, what happened last 10 years there is going to happen in networking in the next 10 years. Because, you know, there's no reason why these things aren't going to happen. The cloud has changed the model people work, people expect to be as a service. More and more of the network traffic is moving from the enterprise into the cloud, or to reach the cloud and that's changing how important is in a network, it's changing how the network's going to operate. >> The cloud certainly has been game changing. And I want to get your thoughts on this. You call it, and before we came on camera I'll make sure we get this out, the cloudification of networking. >> Saar: Correct. >> And this is a term that you coined, what is that mean? Tell us what is cloudification of networking? >> Sure well there are different elements to it, right. But, you know, I think if you look, I think the first thing that's important is to look at it from the user perspective, like what does it mean from a user, right? So if you look at the classic network, you know, 10 years ago most of your traffic is in your campus and in your own data center. And you're using standard Cisco switches, you know, you've got, you know, some hierarchical system you've got your data center, you're using six K's in there, set of nexuses whatever, you've got your end switches some WiFi, that's what the world looks like, that's where everything goes. And you may have someone WAN with MPLS and maybe things like that. But, you know, that's not a big use or some internet use, the internet, but that's not your mission-critical network. If you now fast forward to 2020. I can't even say that >> It's like you've been 10 years. >> 2020 is like, you know, God, all of a sudden, from user perspective, where are you getting your packets from, right? Most of your stuff in a public cloud. So your traffic, whether you're in enterprise or at home, is typically going toward the cloud. The cloud itself has its own very complicated network of 100 gig up to even getting going to 400 gig at some point connections, massive, massive data centers, fully automated, right? In the campus is all Wi-Fi, but again most of the traffic is back and forth to the cloud. So if you look at the network architecture the network architecture you have, the cloud now has completely changed the network architecture from being mostly internal to all being from you to the public cloud. And the public cloud itself now has become such a super compute system, that's like a massive computer. And of course massive computer has massive networking. Now when you think about cloud, so that's from a user perspective. Now let's talk about what this actually means. So first of all, you know, when you think about the cloud, okay, what has enabled the cloud? I mean, the cloud there's nothing special about the cloud. It's a bunch of CPUs and coordinate jobs, okay, but it can happen fast. Why can it happen fast? 'Cause it's automated, right? It's all automated it's all software, right? It's CICD develop, deploy, boom, boom, boom, right? There's nothing you're doing there that you couldn't do 20 years ago it just would take a year instead of a day because nothing was automated, okay. Now you look at networking right? That means that everything is going to be automated and software-centric. So, you know, if you look at the way the network is today, classically, right, it's not really automated. Yes, people have done some scripting and so forth, but it's not an automated dynamic environment that is software-centric. So if you look at, for example, the data center that people are building, if you look at the big public cloud guys have deployed, right, they have deployed a very automated system. You look it and say, "Well how many SIS admins "there are per how many nodes right?" And the ratio is in these public clouds are things that you've never seen in enterprise. So you're seeing the data centers becoming these very cloud-centric networks. And then you're seeing the whole traffic pattern change, where you're mission-critical network now is from where you are to the public cloud over the WAN. And this is what's driving, you know, the evolution of SD-WAN. >> So essentially WAN used to be old school, you had your local area network you mentioned the data center and PCs all connected, hubs and printers. And then you go out over the wide area network to something else, another building another data center maybe third party cloud and and other storage. Now you're saying it's all, essentially, going to the cloud. So WAN is the new LAN then. >> And what happens also is that you quickly get on one of these big networks. So you, you know, you think about, okay, what does the LAN look like, right? Historically the WAN was a bunch of links between data centers, you know, you had leased lines you could go from, you know, you had like every enterprise had I don't know 20, 30 data centers worldwide and then be linked in the WAN. Now what you do is you get on the first connection into an Amazon or Google or Microsoft network and then you're in their network. And so these guys have massive networks. Like, if you ask me, "Who's got the biggest "most impressive WAN? It's Google. They built it for themselves, right. If you put a-- >> So you're saying Google's the best network. of all the clouds? >> Yes, and it's not necessarily long, they don't have it long term, but Google has always been crazy about performance, right. They're crazy about performance because that, you know, it's about how fast can you get a search result and so on-- >> And they had (chuckles), that's money, speed is money to Google, right. >> Speed is money to Google and so Google have, from day one, looked at ways to optimize their network, their internal network, and the Google Cloud gets the benefit of that, right. They are crazy about performance. So they have, Microsoft is getting better, they're working a lot on it. And Amazon I think is now, Amazon is very good inside their network. So they built a lot of, they've been very focused on how fast their internal, like, their data center between the servers and so on. They did Annapurna and they did all kinds of optimizations there, which have actually led the industry. But when you go into the WAN, that hasn't been a big focus for Amazon to date. >> And Google's got great security too they've have lot of security. >> So, you know, from a inside a data center perspective I would say that Amazon is top. Once you start talking about the WAN connection, Google is the best. >> All right, so I'm trying to pull this together. So the cloudification of networking means, if I hear you correctly is, what the LAN used to mean with the data center. You had a data center and you had LANs there was a campus or whatever, is now the cloud. The cloud is now the new data center, and that's the WAN is now the new LAN? >> Correct, exactly correct. The data center is the cloud, the LAN is the WAN, yep. >> So, okay, I get that. By the way I agree with that, I think there's going to be a massive disruption-- >> And again there's a long tail. So you can easily say to me, "No, well look, look at all these LAN's." Sure my future is here, it's not evenly distributed, okay. There's a long tail, nothing's disappearing, but today-- >> How many NICs are in the PCs on the desk these days? Probably not a lot of PCs and no, NICs only Wi-Fi. >> It's Wi-Fi and also, look, there's the question you have to ask is, how many data centers does the average enterprise have? How many new data centers have been commissioned? You know, when I was at HP a decade ago whatever, right? We had data centers up the wazoo, that's where everything was, right. Nobody commission's data centers now. The only people buying data centers are cloud guys. >> Yeah, and we'll get to Equinix comp share I want to get to the Outpost with Amazon, 'cause I think that hybrid edge is an interesting trend that will come into the whole network edge thing. But let's stay on this WAN thing because if you're saying, and I'm agreeing with you, that what the LAN was to the data center you have WAN to the cloud. >> Saar: Correct. >> So if the cloud disrupts and creates an innovative enabling opportunity for startups and the clouds to create new value, it's going to be there. So with that being said, if you believe that, what happens to the old SD-WAN markets because the old SD-WAN was a riverbed was a box you connected one thing to another, in other words-- >> So again, first of all on paper it's a revolution, in the market it's an evolution (laughs). And so, you know, SD-WAN itself has been moving in different directions, you know, it started off with just, okay, we do choices. Now, it's more about WAN and you still have the telcos who are offering services with boxes in front of them. And that's not a bad businesses, it's growing. But, over time, the question you want to have to ask is, if the Amazon or the Google or whatever network becomes bigger and bigger and bigger, how many hops do I need before I just get on their cloud, and then I'm just under cloud and they have a massive internal network? >> I love the expression it's not your grandfather's blank, has always been am expression. So it's not your grandfather's SD-WAN would mean, like, if you look at, like, all the incumbent players you got Cisco even with VMware, they all SD-WAN players. But SD-WAN's different now. So what does SD-WAN look like because you have startups coming out, you have security companies, I'm covering the news on security companies that are becoming SD-WAN. >> Because the firewall, the firewall and your Wanax is becoming the same thing. So if you're a Palo Alto, if you're a firewall company, or if you're an SD-WAN company's security and if your firewall company, right, you need to have SD-WAN, it's becoming the same thing. The firewall used to be the entry point into your network. And now it's SD-WAN, because that's like a distributed firewall, right, that's your perimeter. And so now the difference what's happening in SD-WAN is, you know, in the early days of SD-WAN it was about choice like you basically said, okay, "I can put my slow traffic "or my less important traffic on standard internet "and I can put my important traffic "on my expensive MPLS links, right?" Problem is MPLS is not very dynamic, and people want a lot more capabilities. And so now it's much more intelligent where you have various players saying, "No, I can give you a faster link" not over, like, Teridion the company I used to work for did that, as well as other companies, as well, and so now it's becoming a lot more sophisticated in that. It's like, okay, give me the traffic and I'll figure out how to get it across. And a lot of people are saying you don't even need MPLS anymore. But the thing that's important to understand about the SD-WAN is-- >> That was locked down traffic routes that was essentially application workloads that were earmarked to be high priority or value. Now you have dynamic-- >> Now it's dynamic, but I think the important thing that, the question that you need to ask yourself all the time is. What is the goal? Why does SD-WAN exist? >> John: That's my question. >> So SD-WAN, so why does WAN exist, right? So WAN exist because you want to connect to resources that are further than the LAN right? SD-WAN exists because the existing connections were either too expensive or too inflexible. So we figured out a software way to do that, which is better. But, if all you're trying to do is get to the cloud resources, and the cloud is expanding it's going to eventually push on SD-WAN. >> John: So I've got to ask you, why is there been a renaissance in SD-WAN, what's the reach? >> I don't think there's been a renaissance I think that-- >> John: It's kind of seems to be growing. >> But, it's not a renaissance, it's been growing I don't think it ever stopped. I mean, there was there software-defined networking, which was sort of all talk-- >> Why is SD-WAN exploding in popularity? >> It's exploding because of the cloud. Because what happens is, if you're an enterprise all your traffic now is going to the cloud, and you need a dynamic WAN to support that. MPLS isn't going to cut it anymore for you right? It's not dynamic, it's not flexible. Even if it's not expensive, it's too complicated and internationally too expensive. So if you have like offices all over the world and all they want to do is access your cloud your Salesforce and so forth. It doesn't work very well. It's not dependable. It's not a, unless you tie in a bunch of MPLS lines all the time, it's not very reliable. And so you want something that can do that reliably. >> And SaaS drives that the cloud and SaaS. >> SaaS drives it correct the consumption model of SaaS is driving the need for a better WAN. The current solution for a better WAN is different flavors of SD-WAN. >> I want to ask you about Cisco because one of the things I'm really been focused on is the evolution of Cisco. They own the routes, they have BGP, cloud has networking but there's some needs that the enterprise's might have, certainly at the edge and with the edge of the network, and Cisco has that position. The future of networking in the cloud application of networking if we take this to the next level is, puts a bulls eye on Cisco. It certainly shines a spotlight on their market position and potentially opportunities or losses that they may incur from it. So there's opportunities, there's scenarios of where they can gain big time. And there's scenarios where they could get flat-footed. What your thoughts on their position. >> That's a really good, I think that's a really good point. Look, the good news, so yes, if you look at what happened to the various incumbents in compute, you know, the move to cloud was interesting at best for them, right? And so obviously the cloudification of networking and the fact that more of it will be in the public cloud is going to present some challenges to the existing network players, The biggest one of course and probably the most capable of them being Cisco, of course. But the change will be different because networking, as all the networking geeks always say, is a bit different, right. I think the first thing that, the first challenge that Cisco faces is, you know, we're moving to, as a service, right? And they've started to understand that and, you know, you have like Meraki that provides everything as a service. So I think, they're just a business model thing, they would have to figure out, okay, well how do we charge? Because, you know, people are used to cloud, they're saying well I want everything as a service. I think the bigger challenge that I think-- >> That's working up for some, Nutanix took a year. They took a loss on their stock price for a year but the pivot moved. >> They have to move. And again you have to decide when you make that switch, the innovators dilemma right? Especially someone like Cisco's got massive business you know, you can't just say, "Oh this is cool let's go do that." >> John: Next week. >> So it's a difficult, it's obviously-- >> So they can do as a service. What else do you see? >> The can do as a service. I think the bigger issue for them is when you start doing as a service then the question is what assets do you own in the network on the WAN, right? Today, they tried to do this, when the cloud came up they had their multicloud, I forgot what they called it, and that really didn't play out because they weren't really a compute provider to do that, so that made sense. I think in the network they have a lot more assets. But I think they're going to have to own some assets I think to provide a network as a service they can go two ways, they can rely on the telcos. But, you know, I think CISCO's a bit more agile than the telcos, and I don't know that's going to work. They're trying to do that-- >> There's a new chip coming out. >> They're trying to do that to rely on the telcos to do this as a service. But I think ultimately they're going to have to figure out how to own some networking assets if they truly want to be a player here. >> When you say assets what do you mean by that? more assets-- >> A network, own networks, own a network. Like if you're looking at the, if you look at Amazon or Google so forth, right? They're owning, they're building out networks. If you want to do a network as a service and you don't own some assets, right. >> John: You're relying on someone else. >> You're relying on someone else, and, you know, that works, but, you know, like apple if you want to control the experience you need to own it. Now they understand, the good news about Cisco is, you know, they, Cisco understands all of this, they understand networking, they're very close to their customers, they see what's going on. But, you know, they have innovators dilemma they've got to deal with. >> I would agree, you think they understand what's going on? >> Yes. >> And they just haven't made their moves yet? >> They haven't made moves that are obvious. And also, you know, dilemmas are difficult, right, innovators dilemma, there's a reason why it's called the dilemma. If it wasn't a dilemma, then you'd just go, "Okay let's do this," right (chuckles). So it's easy to sit here and pontificate while they're protecting a whatever $50 billion business. I think that they understand they've got to make choices and they've got to pick the timing of when they do certain things. >> That's the key point. Sometimes the best decision is not to move, but also the time that they waste you can't get that back. So, timings everything here. Just in your opinion, if you were at Cisco what would you do? Get some assets? >> I think that historically when Cisco had to wanted to make big moves like this the way they got around waiting is acquisitions. So, you know, I think that they will have to acquire some, if they want to make this move they choose to make this move it will involve acquisitions, maybe deeper partnerships with some people who currently own networks. There are various players in that area, in that space. But historically, at least, that's been their playbook and that way, because they have a big checkbook, they can make up for the fact that they took their time. >> Yeah, but, also John Chambers addressed transitions with a lot of M&A and it ended up biting them in the butt a little bit because you've got to integrate it all. I personally think that Cisco's opportunity is to be the on ramp for multicloud, to own the edge, and I think they need to find their TCP/IP moment. If you go back to the OSI stack, that changed the game, that created Internetwork, and that created Cisco the open standards. And I see the whole world almost going to proprietary. I remember those days you had DECnet, SNA proprietary NAS, right, and what's interesting now is everyone's going back to these proprietary walled garden kind of models, you know, open source with a twist. So the question I'm looking at is that, is there going to be this interoperable layer, abstraction layer that could exist between creating cloudification of networking and more value? >> Look I think the opportunity, right, but again that opportunity requires a big investment. And Cisco has the ability to make that investment, is to be the on ramp to the multicloud. But that means your network has to be better than the cloud guys because you're honest broker, and to have a map, but you only have one massive footprint whether it's through partnerships or whatever, you have to have massive footprint, that footprint costs money. So like I said, I think if someone could do it, Cisco could do it, but, you know, they have the service providers who are their partners. So, you know, they may not be that happy, requires a big investment, requires a different mindset. I think they understand the challenge. I think, again, they have innovators dilemma, but it's an opportunity and a threat for them. >> Well, Saar, it's great to see you. I know you're just chilling out now advising, investing, you're clipping coupons sitting on the beach. >> Beats is hard, but you know. >> You're doing some fun things. Let's get you back in, there're some things I wanted to chat next time, 5G network automation. I think the analytics, auto tuning, AI is going to be a big thing. I think Wi-Fi application awareness. These are topics I would love to have you come in and do a drill down on, appreciate it. >> Always great to be here. >> Great. Saar Galli, friend of theCUBE. Now analysts here in our studio for future of networking. We're going to continue the series, more networking. Cloudification of networking a big trend, theCUBE is on it. It's going to impact the edge, it's going to impact enterprises, it's going to impact how we do business. And more importantly how software is being built. This is theCUBE here in Palo Alto I'm John Furrier. Thanks for watching (upbeat instrumental)