>>from around the globe. It's the Cube >>with digital coverage of VM World 2020 brought to you by VM Ware and its Ecosystem partners. Welcome back to the Cube. Virtual 2020. Coverage of VM Ware, VM World 2020 Virtual. I'm Sean for your host of the Cube. Join with Dave Alonso. We got a great guest. Carol Carpenter, Who's the chief marketing officer of VM Ware Cube Alumni move from Google Cloud to VM Ware. Carol, great to see you. And thanks for coming on the Cube for VM World 2020. Virtual coverage. Thank you. >>Yeah. Thank you both for having me here. Delighted to be here. >>So we've talked about many times before, but you're very in the cloud. Native space. You know the market pretty well. I gotta ask you what attracted you to come to the end? Where what was the What was the reason? Now you're heading up marketing for VM. Where what was the driving force? >>Well, a few things, you know, Number one. I've always had a passion for this space. I love the cloud. I was involved in an early stage company prior to Google Cloud that really had the promise of helping people get enterprises, get to the cloud faster. Um, and when I, you know, look around and I Look which kind of which companies are shaping the future of technology? VM ware, Certainly one of those companies. Second reason goes without saying the people in the culture, incredible leadership and empowerment all throughout Vienna, where and it's it's quite exceptional. And the third is I really think customers are on a really tough journey. Um, and having been at a hyper scaler, having worked at places where you know, cos air in a more traditional legacy environment, it makes it made me realize like this is a tough journey. And I think the, um where is uniquely positioned to help enterprises with what is a complex journey, and it's a multi cloud world. I'm sure you know that our customers know it. And how do you make all these disparate systems and tools work together to deliver the business results? I believe the M where is uniquely positioned Thio. >>It's interesting. VM Ware is going to a whole nother level. We've been commenting on our analysis segments around the business performance, obviously, and the moves they've made over the years. This is our 11th VM world. Keep started 10 years. 11 years ago. Um, we've been seeing the moves so great. Technology moves, product moves, business performance. The relationship with the clouds is all in place. But then Cove, it hits, okay? And then all that gets accelerate even further because you've got, you know, companies that I have to use this downtime to re modernized. And some people get a tailwind with modern application opportunities. So it's interesting time to be, you know, on this trajectory with VM ware and the clouds, what's your thoughts? Because you join right in the middle of all this and you're in and I of the storm. What's your view on this? Because this is a, uh, forcing function for companies to not only accelerate the transformation, but to move faster. >>Yeah, for sure. You know, it's been an incredibly challenging time, I think for everyone, and I hope everyone who's watching and listening is safe. Um, you know, we talk about decades of progress being made in two weeks, and I guess that's the silver lining. If there is one, which is this ultimate work? Remote work from home that we've enabled and the work anywhere. It's been completely liberating in so many ways. Um, you know, it's an area where I look at, there's how we lead our teams and how do we maintain relationships with customers, which obviously requires a different type of interaction, of different type of outreach? And and then there's what are the solutions at scale And you know, im I pleased to say, like there were absolute big lifts in certain areas of our business, particularly around, you know, remote work and our digital workspace solutions, you know, really enabling companies to get thousands of workers up and running quickly. That, combined with our security solutions and our SD wan solution to really enable all of these remote homes to become thousands of remote offices. So there's all of that, which is incredibly positive. And at the same time, you know, I have to tell you, I joke, but I still haven't figured out where the bathroom is, you know, free three plus months. So that way I miss the human connection. I miss being able to just see people and give people a hug now and then when you want Thio >>e mean, VM. Where? Carol, It's amazing. Company. You mentioned the culture before. It really started as a workstation virtualization company, right? And then so many challenges, you know, and use a computing. You guys do an acquisition bringing Sanjay Poon in all of a sudden, you're the leader there cloud, you know, fumbled a little bit, but all of a sudden, the cloud strategy kicking on all cylinders, we see that, you know, growing like crazy. The networking piece, the storage piece you mentioned security, which is a amazing opportunity. Containers. They're gonna kill kill VM ware. Well, I guess. Guess what? We're embracing them. It seems like culturally vm where it just has this attitude of if there's a wave, you know, we're gonna ride it, we're gonna embrace it and figure out how to deliver value to our customers. What's your thinking on that? >>Yeah. I mean, it's such a VM ware, such an innovative company. And that is another reason that attracted me on disability to look at what customers need. Like, this is an incredibly were an incredibly customer centric company, listening to customers, understanding their needs and providing a bridge to where they need to go while also providing them the resiliency and needs they have today. That is what thrills me. And I think we have such an incredible opportunity to continue to drive that future innovation while also being that bridge. Um, I have to tell you, you know, I've known VM Ware for a long time, and what appealed to me is this broader portfolio and this opportunity to actually tell a broader business value story to be able to actually tell that story about not just digital transformation but business transformation. So that's what that's. That's the journey we're on and it's it's happening. It's really I mean, you look at all the customers, whether it's, you know, JPMorgan Chase to, um, a nonprofit like feeding America to, you know, large companies like Nike. It's really incredible the impact and value we could bring. And I feel that my job and the marketing team's job is, I tell them like they're all these diamonds in the backyard. It's just some of them are a little dirty, and some are they're just not fully revealed, and it's our job, todo and you know, dust them off and tell the story to help customers and prospects understand the value we could bring. >>That's how should we be thinking? How should we be thinking about that? That business value, transformation, business transformation? You you? Certainly when you think of an application's company that there's easily connect the dots. But how should we be thinking about VM Ware in that value chain? You an enabler for that transformation? Can you provide some color there? >>Yeah, let me give you some specific examples like Look at, um, so the addition of Tan Xue to the portfolio is what enables us to have these discussions that, let's face it, the only reason people need or want infrastructure is because they want to deploy an application. They want to write an application. They want to move an application. And Tan Xue, which is our container based, kubernetes based orchestration solution and lots more to it. That's what how it is in simple terms that gives us the ability to work with companies, lines of business as well as developers around riel. Business transformation. So two quick examples one. I can't say the name quite yet, but I think very large pharmaceutical company who wants to launch and have a mobile app to help patients. People who are taking Cove in 19 tests get the results, understand the results, ask questions about the results and have one place to go that's really powerful. And to be able to develop an app that is scale built for scale, built for enterprise, built to be resilient when patients are trying to get information. Um, in four weeks, I mean, that's pretty. That's quite incredible. Another example is, you know, very large e commerce company that, you know, you mentioned Cove it and some of the challenges we know retail has certainly been kind of, ah, tale of two cities, right? Some companies with lots of lift and others with real struggle in the physical world. But anyway, large retailer who had to within weeks flip to curbside pickup, Um, being able to look customers being able to look at inventory on demand, those kinds of capabilities required ah, wholesale rewrite of many of their e commerce applications. Again, that's a place where we can go in and we can talk to them about that. And by the way, as you know, the challenge is it's one thing to write and deploy an app, and then it's another to actually run it at scale, which then requires the networking, scalability and flexibility it requires. The virtual, um, storage. It requires all the other elements that we bring to the table. So I think that is the That's kind of the landing spot. But it's not the ending spot when we talk to customers. >>Carol talk about the challenge of VM World 2020 this year. It's not in person. It's one of them. It's an industry event. It's been one every year. It's a place where there's deep community, deep technical demos, beep deep discussions. Ah, lot of face to face hallway conversations. That's not happening. It's virtual. Um, you came right in the middle of all this. You guys pulled it together. Um, got a You got keynote sessions and thanks for including the Cube. We really appreciate that as well. But you have all this content. How did you handle that? And how's that going and and share some, uh, color on what it took to pull it off. And what's your expectation? >>Yeah, So you know. Yes. VM world is considered the gold standard when it comes to industry events. I mean, from the outside in this is the canonical I t event. And so I feel, really, you know, honored that this franchise is now in my hands and have an incredible team of people who obviously have been working on it for prior to my joining. So I just feel honored to be part of it. Um, this is going to be the world's largest VM world. And on the one hand, miss the energy in the room, Miss seeing people, everything you talked about, the serendipitous interactions that the food line or coffee bar. Um, but going virtual has so many benefits. Some of the things we were talking about earlier, the ability to reach many, many more people. This event is going to be 5 to 6 times larger than our physical event. And that's not even including the VM world that we're running in Asia in China. And the other thing that makes me super happy is that over 65% of our registrants and of the attendees here are actually first time VM world attendees. So this ability to broad in our tent and make it easier I mean, let's face it. You know, being able to fly, whether it was Vegas or San Francisco is originally planned. Stay in these expensive hotels and take that time it was. It's a big ask. So by going virtual, we actually have expanded our audience tremendously. Three other thing I am really excited about is we have 800 plus content sessions. We are following the sun. We have live Q and A after every session. We have really the best mobile app for any events, so I encourage you to take a look at that which does enable the chat interaction as well as you know, path funding through the many channels we have of contact. Its's Look, we're learning, and I'd love to follow up with you later to hear what you've learned because I know you've also been doing a lot. Virtually, I think the world is going to move to something that's more hybrid, some combination of virtual and small group, you know, in person, some local events of some sort. Um, but this one I'm super excited about, we we really have seen high engagement, and I just think, Well, I look forward to hearing everyone's feedback. E >>I think one of the things that we've been hearing is is that I can now go to the M world. I can participate now virtually it's it's kind of I would call First Generation writes me the Web early days. But you're right. I think it's gonna open up the eyes to a bigger community, access a bigger pool of data, bigger pool of interactions and community. And when they do come back face to face, people be ableto fly and meet people they met online. So we think this is gonna be a real trend where it's like the r A. Y of this virtual space is tremendous. You could do demos. You conserve yourselves, you could consume a demo, but then meet people face to face. >>And by the way, we have, you know, a tremendous number of fun activities. Hopefully you've taken part in some of them. Everything from puppy therapy Thio magic shows to yoga Thio Um you know John Legend legend performing. So I agree. I think the level personalization and ability to self serve is going to be out of this world. So yeah, it's just the best. >>Your event, just some key things that we can share with the audience. Cloud City has over 60 solution Demos Uh, there's a VM World challenge That's fun. There's also an ex Ask the expert section where you got Joe Beta and Ragu and other luminaries there to ask the questions of the That's the top talent in the company all online. And of course, you get the CTO Innovation keynote with Greg Lavender. So you know you're bringing the big guns out on display on it. Z free access. Um, it's awesome. Congratulations. We're looking forward Toa see, with the day that looks like after, So what's the story line for you? If you had to summarize out the VM World 2020 this year, what's coming out from the data? What are you hearing? Is the key themes, Actually, the tagline. You know, uh, you know, possible together, Digital foundation, unpredictable world. But what are you hearing, uh, in the virtual hallways? >>Well, a few things, but I'd say the top take away is that VM where has spread its wings, has embraced mawr of the different ICTY audiences and is driving business transformation for companies in new and pretty unique ways. What and then obviously like slew of announcements, new partnerships, new capabilities, everything around multi cloud we have. As you know, every single cloud provider is a partner on the security front, intrinsic security built in throughout the entire stack. The the other part that I I think it's super exciting are these partnerships were announcing everything from what we're doing with and video to make a i mawr accessible for enterprises in production to what we're doing around sassy, secure access Service Edge. Being able to provide a holistic, secure, distributed environment so that every worker, no matter where they are, every endpoint, every remote office could be fully secured. >>You know, in VM where is the gold standard of Of of the Ecosystem and VM world? Of course, they're all in the showcase and it was hard fought. I mean, it took a long time to get there, and you know, the challenges of building that. And now you mentioned in video. You see all these new tail winds coming in and and then I've seen companies launch at VM World. And so you know that ecosystem is, as I say, it is very difficult to build. But then becomes a huge asset because this just gives you so much leverage. A zone organization, your company's your partners, your customers. >>Thank you, Dave. Yeah, we're super excited. And I should say that like the partner and the ecosystem here is unparalleled. And our challenge is how do we provide? And you know, this Like, how do we provide the strategic vision and that practitioner level content? So we're gonna you know, that's what we're committed. Teoh is making sure that our practitioners get everything they need in every every area of expertise, as well as making sure we're conveying our business story. >>Carol, thanks so much for coming on. Really appreciate the inside one final question for you as we get through this crisis soon hybrid comes back for events, certainly. But as the CMO the next gen story, you now have a chief customer officer. We interviewed him. Well, the n words go to the next level. What's your goals? What are you trying to accomplish? And you've got a lot of things going on. Certainly a big story to tell. A lot of ingredients. Toe kinda cook a great, great story here. What's your goals? See him over the next year. >>You know, my goal is to help drive the business transformation and you've heard it from Submit. You've heard it from others at this point. But really, you know, the company is going We're going through a dramatic transformation from being, you know, ah, license on Prem Company to being a multi cloud, modern SAS company. So my goal is to support that. And that means modernizing the way we do marketing which, you know, you say, Well, what does that mean? It means customer focus, customer lifecycle marketing. It means agility, being able to actually use data to drive how we interact with customers and users so that they have those great experiences and they continue to use the product and Dr Adoption and Growth. And the other part of it is, um, b two b marketing, as you may or may not have noticed, is incredibly boring and dull. And I know I'm guilty of this, too. We get caught up in a lot of but jargon and the language, and I am on a mission that we're going to do great B two B marketing that helps customers understand what we do and where we express the value simply clearly and in in differentiated way. >>That's awesome. >>Yeah, Why should the consumer guys have all the fun? Right? >>Right, Well, and that's part of being, by the way a SAS or subscription company is. Everything we do needs to be consumer simple at scale and with the secure ability and the reliability of what an enterprise means. >>Well, I got to tell you that the irony of all this virtual ization of the world with Covic virtual events e one of the big surprise is we're gonna be looking back at is how much it's opened up Thio Mawr audiences and new ways of modernizing and taking advantage of that. Certainly with content in community, you guys are well positioned. Congratulations for a great event. Thank you for coming on and sharing your insights, and we'll keep in touch. We'll try. We'll try to make it exciting, Mister Cube. Thank you. Appreciate >>it. Thank you. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you, John. >>I'm Jennifer David. Lot Cube. Coverage of the M 2020 Virtual. This is the Virtual Cube. Have now virtual sets everywhere. All around the world. It's global. Thanks for watching