>> Live from Washington, D.C., it's theCUBE! Covering AWS Public Sector Summit 2018, brought to you by Amazon Web Services and its ecosystem partners. >> Welcome back, everyone. This is theCUBE live in Washington, D.C. for AWS, Amazon Web Services, Public Sector Summit. This is the event for Global Public Sector, and I'm John Furrier with Dave Vellante; next guest, Salman Al Khalifa, vice CEO of Bahrain, Information and eGovernment Authority, excited to have him on theCUBE, and dying to talk to you for over a year. Welcome to theCUBE; thanks for joining us. >> Thank you for having me, it's a pleasure to be here. >> So, one of the things we've been covering, and Terese has been really hot on this for over a year, and I think people are starting to figure it out, that the digital nation concept of digitizing and being a digital country is a moonshot kind of thinking, but it's reality for a lot of people. You guys have a story working with AWS, I think is super fascinating, so I want to get into it. How did it all start? What are you guys doing? Take a minute to explain what's going on in Bahrain, in your country. >> How did it start? Basically, every IT guy in government, is like bogged down, day in, day out, buying stuff, building stuff, and it's a constant race to just keep changing things over. We've got a really smart leader, and he has a vision. He said, "We're going to go to the cloud." It caught us off guard. What do you mean, take everything and move it to the cloud? That's crazy, but sitting down, really analyzing what the cloud will do for us, I was excited. I mean, take into consideration, 70% of our time is spent buying, installing, and re-buying, and re-installing stuff. So, I'm in a constant cycle of buying, tendering, and you know government bureaucracy. You can't pick up the phone and say "Hey, HP, "get us the server; get us this application." No, you need to put it in the public domain; you need to put in tender, evaluate it publicly, and then, write a contract and the contract... But it takes you to buy anything, six months. So, you're constantly, every month, issuing tenders. And, you're losing sight of what's really important. It's building applications that can help the citizen, not helping vendors. And I think the key thing is we need to focus our attention on building applications that serve the citizens. That's the bottom line; that's what we own. We own the business; we own the data, not the hardware. We don't want to keep buying hardware, so what the cloud gave us was the ability to innovate without having to go through all those hoops. And I think that is the real benefit to us as a government by moving to the cloud. >> Alright, so what's the status of the current situation? Amazon's the provider. >> Yep. >> Talk about the relationship with Amazon, and then we'll come into the cool things that are going on in Bahrain. >> Amazon is a strategic partner. They've opened up a region in Bahrain because the government saw this is the right approach. We've always seen where everything is going. In the 1970s, the government had the first satellite in the region. Lebanon, the war came on, and then the banks panicked. Where do they go? And they came where? The only region that was available and was able to take all the international banks at that time? Bahrain. And so, Bahrain was established as a banking sector. Now, we are betting on the cloud, and Amazon being the biggest and the best with more options for us. We're betting big on Amazon. We believe by having Amazon in Bahrain, they will help stimulate and stimulate innovation of our citizens because at the end of the day, we're not an oil-rich country. Our crowned jewel is the citizen, and the people are the innovators. They are going to be our future developers and entrepreneurs. And making them ready for the cloud is going to help us succeed. And that's where we see Amazon. >> What's the mission and vision of the eGovernment Authority and the modernization with digital? Is it to make citizens happy? Of course. Is it to attract business in? So talk about the mission of Bahrain because, obviously, when you stand up the cloud, Amazon regions, it's like a lot of things are going to start happening. You guys looking for more outward migration, inward migration, of talent and business. What are you guys trying to achieve? >> Business can work anywhere. But business wants to work in an environment where it's easy for them to establish. Without the bureaucracies, they can establish themselves in hours, not in weeks, or in months. That's what we want; we want people to come and establish their business in Bahrain and serve the region. That's the ultimate objective. And have a workforce that is competent enough to work in today's technology, not on yesterday's technology. And I think that is where we see it, as an innovative marketplace that is flexible enough to accommodate any international company coming in, and help stimulate local products, and that's the other part. >> So you have to have the infrastructure that attracts those people. >> Exactly. >> That makes them want to come to you. That's almost table stakes. Right now, talk about your journey. We saw this gentleman from the CIA talk about the icebergs today, that the part you see, maybe the software, maybe the licenses, but there's everything else that you talked about, the installation, the planning, the maintenance. How has that been affected or how do you expect that to be affected that below the iceberg that you see? >> So we've built up the below the iceberg. We're actually moving to the new iceberg, but that's the iceberg, is the cloud. So, we already have, there are a lot of smart people that work with us, and they've adapted their architecture and our applications to suit the cloud. And what they've done is they've come up with a master architecture for all the government agencies to follow. We don't need to reinvent the wheel. We tell them how to do it; this is how you're going to protect yourselves, and we have the team there to support all the 40 agencies that are moving to the cloud. So that's step one; we've got the right architecture, we've got the right security in place that is open to, that has so many options and flavors that allows them to innovate, as well-- >> You've got a lot of-- >> Down to single stack. >> You've got a lot of flexibility, but also, just to give you guys some credit, you're the first country to adopt a cloud first-- >> Yes. >> Policy. >> In the region. >> Yes. >> In the region; this is historic. What's the impact of that; what's been the feedback? Are people confused, are they happy, are they jumping up and down, what's going on? >> Truth? Panic. (laughing) To start. Like I did. But once they understood what's at stake, oh they're loving it. We can't keep up, some agencies are faster than others, some are slower than others, and for different reasons. Obviously, the different stacks that they have. But in reality, now, fear has changed over to excitement. And I think, that I can see right now. We can't keep up, so we had to work with local partners to help other agencies move to the cloud faster. So, that is the positive side. So, as you already mentioned, you saw us start with the cloud first, but once you do that, they need to be educated, so we've set up sort of a program where we can re-skill the IT guys in government and say, "Here you go, here's the courses. "Go in, no charge. "We're going to help skill you up to the cloud," and they're loving it. Anybody, especially our developers, they're loving it. Anything away from operations, they're loving it. They don't need to deal with the operations guys. Because we've already started to establish a dev-ops, and with this dev-ops, the agility of moving, seamlessly, the application faster to the cloud becomes much smoother. >> Talk about startups in the region, the startup mentality. When John first told me about Bahrain, we were so excited to have you on. He's like, "Dave, this country "is like the startup mentality country." Talk about startups, cloud, and that mentality. >> In the region, previously, there's not much startups historically. But with the cloud, that is the ultimate catalyst for any startup. If you had an idea, and you wanted to develop it, you used to have to invest a lot of money into infrastructure, security, but with the cloud, with serverless, with all the tools that you've got, it's going to cost you nothing to establish an application. You have enough tools to compete against the big establishments out there. So we've got Careem, for example, which is basically a local taxi hire company, like Uber of the world. And it's doing incredibly well, shockingly well. And they are like the Cinderella Story of the region. And now, everybody's into it. Everybody's building applications. Last application that I heard was a guy who links up all the fishermen in the ports, and they can sell their fish to the locals without the middleman. And that's what you're going to see, some small guys coming up and girls coming up with applications that will innovate the way they do business, and we will see a lot more of it with the cloud. >> That's a motivational factor. People are seeing real advantages coming off this what was once a scary prospect of cloud to innovation actually happening. Okay, how do you continue it? What's the plan? How're you going to keep the train rolling, keep the momentum going? What's the focus, what's your plan? >> So we've got the economic development board, and the economic development board will handle that sector. Basically, their focus is stimulate the market regionally and locally and help innovators and entrepreneurs establish themselves on the cloud in Bahrain. And they are giving them every kind of support you can imagine: capacity building, capacity on the cloud, even accounting, business advice, all of that is free. And that is amazing. So as a startup, you know the tech, you know the problem. But you don't know how to establish that from the cloud. Alright, go to these guys, and they say, "Okay, "Here's enough credit through another organization. "Take it to the cloud. "You want to market your product? "Here's another company." And that is all embedded, and free of charge. That will, I believe, really help stimulate the small, but innovative companies and help them grow. >> So thoughts on the AWS partnership. Obviously, they chose to put a region in the region in your country. That's got to be huge, but what's the relationship like with AWS? Where do you want to see it go? >> Alright, so we're at the lift and shift stage of that. We just started, as you guys are aware. But already, in the pipeline, we're looking at innovations on the cloud. So, healthcare is a big deal for us, and we believe that the healthcare in the region has a lot of opportunities to improve. And by moving the healthcare system to the cloud and leveraging artificial intelligence, and helping things like oncology departments identify cancer better, treat cancer better, using technology, I think is the next frontier for us. I think that is an opportunity. I believe we'll see a lot of more innovation and simplifying government processes through mobile apps that are becoming much better. But I think we'll be more efficient. We will be able to continuously improve government services, for example, in the cloud at a faster rate. It used to take us two years for a change, now it's going to take us weeks for a change. That's the degree of flexibility and rapid response that we can give to our citizens, to our guests that come into the country, to satisfy their demands. >> And your developers. >> Yes, our developers love it. >> It's a huge economic opportunity to grow a new generation of citizens that are tech-savvy, and they don't have to be total nerds. Anyone can be programming, anyone can be developing big data. It should open up, I think, really good commerce for you guys, as well. I think that's a great opportunity. The question is, when is theCUBE going to come to Bahrain? When are we going to see theCUBE? >> We're getting you on the plane right now. (laughing) >> Salman, thanks for spending the time. Great to see you, final question: For the folks watching back at home and around the world, AWS Public Sector Summit here in Washington, D.C., what's your impression, the vibe? What's the content? For the people who aren't here, take a minute to share your color commentary on what's happening here. >> I think it's very difficult to express the enthusiasm. It's in the air, you can smell it, you can feel it, the way people are talking. It's not only the private sectors that are talking about moving to the cloud, it's government. And you feel it here. It's not a pipe dream; it's a reality. And I think coming here to really show people that the world is changing, and if they're not on the cloud, they're going to be left behind. That is my impression. >> It's a big opportunity. >> Absolutely. >> Salman, thanks for coming on theCUBE. We really appreciate it, great to see you on theCUBE. It's theCUBE, I'm John Furrier with Dave Vellante bringing you all the action, most important stories happening here at AWS Public Sector Summit. Bahrain, cloud first policy, really going to pay off, a real investment in the future of their citizens. An example of being cloud first, creating value. Stay with us. More live coverage here in Washington after this short break. (techno music)

>> Live from Washington, D.C., it's theCube. Covering AWS Public Sector Summit 2018. Brought to you by Amazon Web Services and its ecosystem partners. >> Welcome back to the nation's capital everybody. You're watching theCube, the leader in live tech coverage. My name is Dave Vellante, I'm here with Stuart Miniman, and we're covering, this is day one of the AWS Public Sector Summit, #AWSPSSummit, got that right, right, Stu? >> You did, Dave. >> Lynn Martin is here. She's the Vice President and General Manager of Government, Education, and Healthcare at VMware. We got news. Lynn, welcome to theCube. >> Thanks for having me. >> It's our pleasure. So let's start, before we get into the news, let's start with VMware and Public Sector. You were kind of explaining to us off-camera. Talk about VMware and its role in Public Sector. >> So VMware has been ingrained in the government agencies and the education across state, local, and federal government for the beginning of VMware. There's billions of dollars of investments across all the different parts of Public Sector. So we have a trusted partnership, 90% share of wallet across those agencies, and the different entities across state and local government as well. And today, I'll pivot a little bit towards the announcement, today's announcement. We were partnered with AWS around the VMC on AWS GovCloud. Today, we offer VMC on AWS. That is a commercial offering that supports all of our customers that do not require the same levels of security that the federal government and some of our state and local customers require. >> Lynn, I'm just wondering. We're intimately familiar with VMC. John Furrier was at the announcement with AWS, and VMware went and announced. But for our audience that's not, maybe just the short summary as to what that solution is. >> Sure. So VMware Cloud, that's VMC, on AWS, allows you to leverage the VMware suite of product sets that are already being used in running your data centers today. And then be able to move your workload into the public cloud. So we call it hybrid cloud technology, utilizing the tools of the software-defined data center that are already running in those customer environments, and give you the flexibility and agility to move workloads in and out as you need for your business demands at a high level. >> We were just speaking to the former CTO of the CIA, and he took us back to sort of the initial impetus for the CIA moving to cloud. And he gave four things, velocity, efficiency, drive innovation, and security. If I think about the early days of VMware and the impact that it had on the data center, I could have listed those same four things. It's now we're just taking it up another level. >> Right. >> In terms of everything is higher velocity, the drive for efficiency is even greater. Innovations like we've never seen before, and security is more important than ever before. So you go that dialed up, but you also now have, to your point, the hybrid factor. Used to be all on prem, now we got this morphing into public and private. So I wonder if you could talk about sort of those four pillars. They're similar issues for IT people today as it was yesterday. >> I don't think they've changed, to be honest with you. >> That's what you're hearing from customers, right? >> So I would say, part of the desire to move forward with the VMC on AWS GovCloud is what we've heard from customers. So the solution will provide that flexibility even at another level than public cloud, because today, as most people know, when you go to move your applications, CIA's a great one, they started that endeavor I think three years ago plus? Maybe four, it's coming on? Three to four? To get those workloads moved is heavy lifting. So with the flexibility of the VMC on AWS, and I think that's what's interesting in the partnership between Andy and Pat around this, is really being able to take that software layer and being able to move much faster. So a great example would be MIT had built an on prem solution with VMware. Just recently we moved them to VMC on AWS. Those workloads got moved in days. The first time it took months and months and months and a year before we could move all 900 workloads. Literally that was done in less than two weeks and it could go back and forth. So the flexibility for new things when they come up, and then when you wrap that around with the security layers, I think that's what really creates a unique value proposition. So I think public cloud's here. I think you're going to see in the future over the next three to five years more and more different cloud providers, and hybrid cloud technology with that layer that allows you to figure out where you want to go, when you want to go, unique situations, if you think about the government, omissions that come up. That gives you a flexibility to move at a speed that doesn't exist in the marketplace today. >> Yeah, Lynn, I remember last year at VMworld I talked to a customer, and there was a group inside the company that was like we need to do more cloud, we need to move faster. But from an administrative standpoint, it's like, ugh, I need need to retrain, I need to do things, the talent, and they're like, when I told them it's a full VMware stack, they were like, they actually opened up and they were able to move forward, and that was step one in making changes as to how they were building their applications. >> That was, Teresa's keynote today had a slide on the people piece. And I think one of the biggest benefits today is that your talent is already trained on the VMware tools. So you're not really getting through that mindset of doing everything different and retraining and trying to figure out how to get the expertise in. Those same computer operators that run the Vmware environment can now run your cloud environment. >> That's a really important point. I remember when Hadoop first kind of hit the scene. Everybody wanted SQL, because they didn't have to re-skill. >> Exactly. >> And that was a game-changer. And this is part of the, I want to bring in the Modernizing Government Technology Act. So to the extent that you don't have to completely re-skill, you're going to be able to-- >> Modernize. >> Modernize faster, right? >> Right. So I think today, the differentiator from the beginning of VMware was, we still had to teach a lot of the workforce how to use the VMware tools. Now, everybody was behind. If you worked at an HP or Dell or IBM, anyone selling hardware for server consolidation, they learned quickly how to spin up a VM and then move. Today, those organizations have invested in other software-defined data center tools, whether it be our networking tools, our storage tools, and then you got the compute layer, and you can abstract that up and then have a management feature that allows you to make your hybrid cloud decisions, and look at price points across the market as well. With the same people that know how to work that environment and manage it. And I think part of the issue is when you look at server virtualization in the early days, I happened to work at another company back then, the challenge we ran into was the change-management processes at the government sites, and it took years to transform the workforce into that type of an environment. >> So an example would be maybe security, or backup, would be, I would think, would be-- >> Easy, DR. >> Yeah, DR, data protection. >> Or new missions for things, or the postal service for the Christmas mailing system instead of spending millions of dollars in spin-up infrastructure, you spin out to the cloud, then in January you come back in to your own prem database. >> Okay, but I wonder if you could help explain a little bit, what goes into getting VMC on GovCloud? We heard from Teresa there are certain things that was like, oh, Aurora's on there, it's like, oh, we've been talking about Aurora for a while, so why isn't it ready day one? What's the process to get through it? And can you give us a little visibility as to when this will launch? >> So what we announced today was our intent to enter into the FedRAMP process jointly. So the engineering teams both are working right now on the solutioning. The differentiator is we already have the VMC on AWS, as you guys know, and it's available in quite a few places, and more are spinning up and being announced, of the AWS locations. It's taking that through the security accreditation processes that the government has. And we will be pursuing FedRAMP High, as well as DoD impact levels. So we are going for the highest levels of security, 'cause then you can do everything else after that. >> Okay, but it's not a days or weeks kind of initiative. This is a months plus kind of thing. >> Months, but once you enter into the FedRAMP process which we're looking towards fall of this year, once you enter in, you actually can start going after procurements in there, because you're in process, so through that. >> I mean, that's early, you just announced it. But maybe you talked to a few customers beforehand. What's the reaction been, what's the feedback? >> So we have a list of customers that are fighting to be our sponsor. We have more customers wanting to sponsor it than we can have. >> So you do you then-- >> And I would say the driver from the market really to push this with VMware was customers. >> Yeah. >> Customers were like, VMC on AWS is great, but these customers here that we're talking to at Public they're all like, we need it on AWS GovCloud. >> It's interesting how things have changed so quickly. It was like VMware and AWS were kind of adversaries. It was a lot of fear that oh, the public cloud is going to kill, and then all of a sudden, these two companies come together, and you see this huge momentum. >> Well and I think that it's a unique value proposition that isn't offered in the marketplace combined. So all the cloud proprietors that are there today, I think they still are struggling with how you, you know, you can move workloads, but then there's going to be some you just can't get off of the VMware platform. I could go count by count, and there's some they're keeping in house. This allows you to afford the flexibility of the cloud environment, utilizing what you have there on prem. >> Well, and you're share of wallet. >> True hybrid. >> But your share of wallet makes it different as well, because you have such a huge footprint. Other cloud companies have relationships, or other companies have relationships with cloud companies, but VMware is the standard. >> For virtualization. >> Right? So that's kind of, you know, those customers talking, and Jessie always says, we're customer driven, we're not competitive driven. I mean, I think the culture-- >> I think for us as well, I'm sure you guys have talked to Pat. So even with us, I think we realize, that's a good marriage for us too, and our customers. It solves a problem that no one else has solved. That's very unique. >> Has the Dell acquisition, what has that changed, if anything, or expanded, or, culturally? I know VMware's largely sort of its own separate entity, but still, you know, Michael's around, he's very-- >> I just spent last week here at a bunch of customer meetings with Dell on executive calls with their worldwide sales leader. So I would say that the culture between Dell, legacy Dell, and VMware are very similar. EMC a little different, but the culture between those two are very, very similar. I think the good news is, and I give Michael Dell a lot of credit for this with the Dell Technologies, which is a collection of all the companies underneath that, VMware, Pivotal, Secureworks, RSA, Dell EMC, et cetera. He really has tried to put together a business model that customers get the benefit of that. So when VMware was owned by EMC, we kind of said, oh yeah, you can get EMC VMware together, but then customers had to write two contracts, customers had to deal with two different, here, Michael's allowed, in Creative Frameworks, to allow customers to get the benefits of Dell technology when they want to. They don't have to. VMware still is this independent company and we work with all the different companies. But he's created an environment that really is conducive for the teaming for customers' best interests. >> So, Lynn, what should we be watching, you know, near-term, mid-term, long-term, in terms of just, adoption, in federal, maybe partnerships, ecosystem growth? >> So I think you'll see what we're already beginning to see across the marketplace with non-GovCloud adoption, and I would say that the Public Sector team is actually driving a faster rate of adoption than other parts of our business already. >> Really, okay. >> Very interesting to see what's going on in all our joint planning meetings with Amazon and VMware, and looking at the adoption we're seeing from the government as well as state and local and education. And then I think you'll see the ecosystem. Terese and I have worked through who's the right ecosystem. What does that look like? Who are yours, what are ours? You know that's been a big emphasis for AWS. So it's very complementary. We've got distribution set up to be able to enable us across this market. Because that's important for the markets and because of they they procure, we have to do everything uniquely for them. So I think there's going to be a lot of exciting stuff, and then as soon as we can get in process, with a lot of activity in the market to respond to. >> But you also, you touched on it, but you do healthcare and education as well. >> I do. >> Very quickly, what are the sort of similarities and differences there relative to-- >> I see a lot of similarity between all three verticals. They're all unique in their own way. But because they're unique, there's benefits of it being together for VMware. So a great example would be, our commercial healthcare business may not have FedRAMP, but they have special certifications for patient records and things that require engineering to build special products a certain way to support our healthcare market. So you can take the same processes and things that we put together and applied for federal and state and local, and then apply it to the healthcare market. The other piece I would say is some of the things we're doing first, and I would compliment AWS on this, is they really did a good job of standing up the government business, and it provided benefit to the rest of their business as a result of that emphasis in government. I think the same thing applies across VMware as we start to look at the verticals that have special needs, and then because you can handle different kinds of security requirements and things that are unique, it's easier to scale that back towards the other business, as a benefit. Like financials, think about it. If it's good enough for certain customers, CIA and things like that, it's good enough for them, right? Or patient care records. Things like that. So there's actually application of all that to the other pieces, and then there's this 20% that fed's different because they're fed. SLED's different 'cause they're SLED. And then healthcare's different 'cause it's healthcare. So we see a lot of great synergy. That's relatively new. Last year we merged the healthcare team into the new organization. >> Kind of like our kids do. >> Yeah, that's right. >> Well Lynn thanks so much for coming to theCube, it was great having you. >> I enjoyed it, thanks so much. >> All right, keep it right there buddy, we'll be back with our next guest. Dave Vellante for Stu Miniman, John Furrier's here as well. You're watching theCube from AWS Public Sector Summit, and we'll be right back. (techno music)