>> Announcer: Live from Las Vegas, it's theCUBE, covering Dell EMC World 2017, brought to you by Dell EMC. >> Hey, welcome back everyone. We're here live in Las Vegas for Dell EMC World 2017. This is theCUBE's eighth year of covering, since the inception of theCUBE. EMC World, which is now called Dell EMC, with the first year of the combination coming together. Exciting, a lot of storylines here. I'm John Furrier with SiliconANGLE, and my co-host with SiliconANGLE, Paul Gillin. Our next guest, Jeff Boudreau, who's the president of Dell EMC Storage Division. It sounds weird to say that because EMC used to be a storage company. Now, they're a part of Dell Technologies with a zillion brands. Jeff, welcome to theCUBE. >> Thank you for having me. >> So first, explain quickly what the storage division is, because Chad Sakac does converge infrastructure, but, you own all the storage. >> Jeff: Correct. >> So just quickly, just. >> Yeah, real quick, keeping it simple, if you think about the components and the building blocks, you have Ashley running compute, you have Tom Burns running network, you have myself running storage, and you have Beth Phalen running data protection, and then Chad's the converge platform, so when we integrate the solution, Chad has that piece. So yes, all storage, and that would be Legacy or Heritage Dell storage, but also Heritage and Legacy EMC storage. All that came together so, just massive revenue, massive amounts of customers, and then obviously tons of engineers around the world. >> You got a lot of work to do. Obviously storage is not going away. It's changing radically and in different ways. Certainly cloud is accelerating it. The data center world is changing. They call it data center. They don't call it server center. They call it the data center 'cause there's more data coming. So I got to ask you, one of my favorite quotes in your keynote this morning was, "We have self-driving cars. "Why don't we have self-driving storage "or autonomous storage?" Which is provocative, but also very relevant. Can you explain what you meant by that, and let's dig deeper into that. >> Yeah. I mean, actually, it's one of my favorite topics, actually. So I have these notions of the pillars of innovation, right? And I want to start looking at, to your point, things are changing in the markets and in the way customers are using our products, and I want to embrace that change and innovate around that change. The notion of the day in the life of the storage admin, or the day in the life of the data center admin, and the day in the life of just about anybody using the product. We got to make it simpler, right? It goes back to consumer simplicity, a lot of this stuff. What we're trying to do there is actually make the storage be smart enough to actually just take care of itself. It's kind of the set it and forget it notion. So, as part of autonomous storage, we look at four attributes simplistically, in regards to how you would have a self-driving system. The first one is about being application-centric, 'cause, at the end of the day, it's all about the app and the workload. We all know that, right, and that's what the users care about. So the way I kind of looked at that this morning is, the example is, that's like telling your car where you want to go, or is it a turn-by-turn decision, right, that you would give it? The second thing is about being policy driven. I'm not going to say, hey listen, do I want to take the fastest route or do I want to take the scenic route? >> John: Yep. >> Right, simplistically. And then, I'm going to be honest, that stuff's relatively easy and we do a bunch of that stuff today. Really when it starts to get the next level is when this stuff becomes self-aware, right? Understanding its resources, and then understanding if you're in or out of those boundaries. So, am I, you know, swerving out of my lane? Do I have enough gas? Dot, dot, dot, right, as an example. And then where it gets really powerful is the fourth component for me, is self-optimization. That's being able to understanding what, you're self-aware and then making a better outcome for your customer. At the end of the day, that could be, hey, there's not enough charging stations to get to your destination, or you don't have enough charge, or better yet, the storage will actually or the system would tell you, hey take this path. There's enough charging stations. I'll get you there on time and safely, right? >> So you'd be very happy if you had the brand bumper sticker of the Tesla of storage. >> Absolutely. >> To your point about the stations, you know, people love Teslas. It's very sexy and it's relevant. I got to ask you about machine learning. It's obviously AIs hyped-up. We call it, not artificial intelligence, more augmented intelligence. That's a better definition because artificial intelligence is this weak, weak word. (laughing) It doesn't really exist, it's kind of out there. But, augmentation of value is about machine learning and deep learning. These are the learning systems you mentioned. Self-optimization, that's basically learning machines. >> That's right. >> What are you guys doing around big data, I meant big data machine learning and some of these things? >> So we're doing a handful of things. So along the keynote, I mentioned builtin analytics. That's two things, you know. Dell EMC, we store, protect and secure more data than anybody else in the world, par or not. So, you know and I used to joke, EMC used to be known for where information lives. Dell Technologies and Dell EMC has to be known for where information comes alive, right? And actually providing value or generating value for our customers. So, what we're going to do is, we're going to have builtin capabilities into the array, but also we're going to plug into the broader ecosystem, you know, with analytics and service providers to really help drive that value and that creation. So, you'll see a lot more around the storage itself around that self-learning and understanding. That kind of, the core components of an array. What makes it run healthy or unhealthy enables the customer to better utilize and add more value to their stack. Then also, going into that broader ecosystem, making sure that they can really drop that value to their customers and to their business. >> What pieces will you be delivering first? >> On the storage side itself, specifically, we'll be, we already have a lot of products that have probably two or three of the capabilities. So between app-centric, policy driven, and self-awareness, those are the ones we're on right now, big time. And I have a team focused on the machine learning, so we can really start self-optimizing. We actually just, we mentioned, I don't know if the guys that were on, where all the folks we've had on the show talked about a thing called cloud IQ? >> Paul: Yes, they did. >> That was something that we built a SAS model in the cloud, which is all about machine learning. >> So, that's part of this whole rollout, is moving to the cloud eventually. >> Oh, absolutely. It's critical. >> So another quote that I have off from your keynote, because it had some great soundbites, Isilon, one of the products in your portfolio, "Isilon is known to be the gold standard "for storage in the genome sequencing." Obviously, with the massive amounts of computers available, certainly cloud computing has now made it possible to do amazing things with the data, and make that literally come alive, and hopefully people could live longer. But, genome sequencing is actually doable, and price points at. >> It's crazy, probably the last two years alone, it's dramatically and drastically just reduced. >> But why is Isilon the gold standard for sequence? What specifically is it that's great about it? >> Well, it basically, in regards to the data structure and how we can process that big data, and make sense of it quickly as we analyze it, there's nothing faster in the market. And it'd be interesting, and now that we've brought out the Isilon All-Flash array with the new infinity platform, we've taken something that, two years ago took weeks, down to days, down to hours, and with the All-Flash array we've taken it down to minutes, 22 minutes to be exact. >> So I got to to ask you, I'll let you think about the portfolio question and I'm going to ask in about a minute how you're going to rectify all that, where the overlap is or isn't, so you can work on that, but the next question is, the industry, you're not seeing a lot of start-ups trying to do what Isilon did. You heard Isilon guys leaving, starting companies, and everyone's kind of pivoting, but you are seeing startups in the white spaces, data protection, so question, how hard is it to do a startup right now and get venture funding, because it seems to be scale is the issue, and it's hard to be a, quote, pure storage company, pun intended. Pure Storage was the last company to challenge you guys. (laughing) >> You know, I've also thrown that app in there as well, it's standing on their own, regardless of that. But, let's be clear, this market is consolidating. That's good for us, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. So, with our size and scale, Dell and EMC, and Dell Technologies together, our size, our scale, our buying power, unmatched by anybody. It's going to be hard, for you know, there's a lot of companies. >> Hard nut to crack, for a start up to come in and it could be the table stakes are too high. >> So in regards, the innovation, spending R&D, value chain that we get, efficiency, buying power, intel, I mean think about all the stuff around the whole ecosystem, it's just really hard to do, so this market is consolidating. We're good with that. What I want to do is consolidate this market faster, and I want to drive more share of this market in regards to that, and I think it's really tough. So, you've seen small guys be bought recently. Some guys that aren't doing well. Some people, >> Acquihires. >> Maybe some of these orange people are really in the red, going back to your pun. So, they're struggling, right, some of these guys are struggling, so I really think this is an opportunity, as we force this market as it consolidates, for us, I think it's a real big thing. >> Alright, so the question on the consolidation, sorry Paul to interrupt, but okay. I get the consolidation. Now the growth, we're going to put the pedal to the medal. It's going to come from where? You got a mature market, you're consolidating. You lock that in, so that's big dollars by the way. It's not like small numbers, and the table stakes are high so, storage going to crack that nut. Then you got to have the growth strategy where there's a hockey stick opportunity. >> Yeah, so, from a storage perspective, let's be clear, they're going to have the growth. It's going to come through things like HTI. It's going to come through things like software-defined, in regards to how we do that, right? That's obviously part of, software-defined is part of my portfolio as well, so, it will be a journey in regards to where we grow. The traditional space is huge, let's be very clear. It's massive, right. We have to do that and do that extremely well, and protect that, and make sure our customers are taken care of, but as they go on their journey, if it's software-defined, or cloud, or what have you, we want to make sure we're relevant can help with that. So, one will be taking share in that space, there'll be opportunities as the consumption models, the technology, and the deployment models change, we'll be front and center in all of those. >> Speaking of software-defined, essentially that can deposition some of the storage elements below it. Cisco is wrestling with that right now. Where they sort of held off for a couple of years on software-defined network, and they're finally embracing it. What are you doing to balance the need for your, the elements of your portfolio to shine, with also the need to get customers to software definition? >> Absolutely, so, right now, I mean, it's a journey. Let's be clear, right, so, I have a, actually, a large customer that was on stage with me. I'll leave their name out, if anyone wants to watch who I talked to on day one, they'll know who I'm talking about. They're on a journey. Right now, today, they're probably one of the, I would say, leaders in software-defined storage and driving software-defined storage is part of their IT transformation and their data centers. They're 20% software-defined, 80% still traditional physical infrastructure. They have a big stake in the ground. In three or four short years, 2020, they're going to be 50/50. Right, and these the guys that are leading and driving. So just give the folks a little bit of balance in regards to yes, that's where their growth will come from, this is where the appeal is, but it will be a journey in how we get through that, but also for me, going back to scale and Dell Technologies, I have products like Scale IO. I have virtual Isilon, I have virtual Unity. In regards to what we do with ECS, that's an object store, so file blocker object, we have it. And then I have wonderful 14G servers from my friend Ashley in the compute team. Go well together. >> So, Pat Gelsinger's talking about a developer-ready infrastructure. You've mentioned on your keynote, I thought was clever, the cloud-ready storage. Talk about that dynamic because, love this soundbite, "Storage has to be cloud ready, cloud connected, "build out on off prim, and live in a multi-cloud world." Don't comment on the multi-cloud. We think that's going to happen. Not ready for primetime right now. I'm pretty certainly it is happening. Their is some latency issues on multi-cloud. >> Sure >> We don't want to digress. But hybrid is definitely happening, but multi-cloud is the gateway, hybrid cloud is the gateway to multi-cloud. Dealing with legacy to cloud native, that gap with hybrid. How do you look at that, cause that's truly going to be a great opportunity for you, and being cloud storage ready, I'm sorry, cloud ready. >> Cloud ready. >> Ready storage, how do you make that happen? >> Yeah, so, cloud connections is one of the big ones for me. So, the ability to connect to the cloud and allow people to move, seamlessly move data in and out of the cloud. So depending if it's a traditional on prim or off prim, so we have great technologies for file, we have CTA, which is a cloud tiering appliance, all file based, gets rave reviews from our customers and we're able to help them not only on our products but actually on some competitor file products to move it off to the cloud if need be, which has actually been a pretty big win for us. In addition to that, Isilon has a notion of cloud pools that people haven't seen, but again it's a transparent seamless data mobility from Isilon, from core to the cloud, if you will. Then, lastly we have a cloud array, which is a block device that allows us to move block data from a traditional asset into the cloud as well, so, we have a handful of products or features that are natively in certain products today. We'll be evolving that over time. >> You got everything! >> Well we'll be evolving that over time too, so we want to have a more coherent simple storage for our customers, right? It doesn't matter what the data type is, we want to be able to present it to the cloud. >> But you, by that I mean EMC, were late to the Flash market, but have caught up, are now the leaders in the Flash market. Phenomenal growth year over year. What did you do to pull that off? That's kind of counter-intuitive. >> Focus and energy, and a lot of great engineers. I'll be honest with you, alright. And then a great sales team behind it as well. So, we were late to the game. We made some decisions to lead with certain products and drive certain products where if we, you know if you took a step back, I think we'd said, "Hey, listen, we all agreed Flash was critical. Flash will be everywhere, compute, storage, network." And then you could debate on the consumption model, if it would be all Flash systems versus hybrid systems, or what have you. At the end of the day, Flash was pretty critical, and I think we're all on the same page there, in regards to how you want to attack the problem, if it's a hybrid or all Flash, that's maybe where we got a little stuck in our own way. But then focus from all the teams, if it was Bemax or Midrange or Xtreme IO, Isilon now. Teams have done an amazing job catching up, and then working with Billy and Marius, and the go-to-market teams, they've been phenomenal. It's been a huge shape with our. >> Well that's a good point to my portfolio question, is you guys really worked that problem hard. I think it was a two year window, we saw all kinds of architecture, but that was good timing on that, because you were early on the trend architecturally was happening in a real sense, although late to the game. Things kind of played out and you kind of shaped your portfolio up during that time. Kind of a forcing function. One, is that what happened, and two, what is the current view of the portfolio right now? Do you feel comfortable about the overlap, gaps, things that you think about? >> Yeah absolutely, so let me take the media one first, and go back to Flash specifically. We learned a lot, and yes that did help us shape our portfolios and go forward and actually try to focus specific architectures to specific-use cases to make our customers successful. We also learned is we didn't ever want to be late again. That's why, with NVME specifically, that we actually were major contributors and actually a codeveloper on NVME. Which others can talk about NVME in their marketing material. They weren't actually at the table codeveloping. >> You get the scar tissue, saying if we don't get out in this, we're going to. (laughing) >> That's right, so we've learned and I don't want it to happen again. I want to be a learning organization. I don't want it to happen again, so we're going to be driving that, and we'll be a leader in NVME, and as more media transitions happen in Flash, there'll be more, trust me, a few years down the road beyond that, we're already looking at, we'll continue to make sure that we're a leader in that space. Now on the portfolio, I talk to customers all the time. They love the portfolio in the sense of, that they understand, they believe in the fact that there's no, one size does not fit all. They have said, though, "Hey you got a lot of products "and you have to simplify." In full transparency that's something we've been working through and we'll continue to work through that. We will have overlap, and we want overlap, it's good. >> John: Better to have overlaps than gaps. >> And Joe Tucci was a huge person and I couldn't support more but we want it to be planned overlap versus unplanned overlap, because we want to be making sure we want to make our customers successful, and we say hey, and that we can articulate clearly to our customers why they'd use a product and the value its going to drive for their use-case, for their application. Same thing our sales guys, same thing for our service guys, same thing for our own engineers. We want to keep people aligned and focused on what we're trying to do. So that way, we can provide a better outcome on the other side. >> Are you looking at, when you're looking out at the future, do you see anything disruptive on the horizon? Is there anything that could change this industry fundamentally? >> Obviously, I always keep cloud in the back of mind. It's still something, you know. Depending on how people want to portray it or look at it. People call it a destination, some people call it a media, what have you. I call it a virtual infrastructure. Depending on how you want to define it, there's different ways. >> A mainframe in the sky. >> You know, I say that one always keeps me up at night, depending on how things go, but there's a lot of cool things going on in storage actually where I think, first, let's be clear, storage in general maybe hesitant. It's lost some of the sex appeal, if you will, the attractiveness of it. I think that's starting to come back with some of the things like NVME and cloud-ready and multi-dimensional scaling. There's a whole bunch of things going around there that actually is going to kind of drive that back. Now in addition to that, though, we all know internet of things, machine learning, you know, video, it's exploding. So let's be very clear there'll be a lot, >> Storage is not going away, but the machine learning certainly is going to be a nice jolt in the arm for optimization and automation. >> There's a huge opportunity there, in regards to that. Cloud is one of the big ones, but I think there's a lot of things, I guess the had-wins stay at wins, there's a lot of things in favor to really kind of push us forward. >> Jeff Boudreau, thank you for coming on theCUBE. We really appreciate the insight, and candid commentary and analysis and insight into your business. Appreciate it. You got the storage, it's not going away. It's called the data center and the cloud for a reason. It's all about the data and the value of business will be data driven. This is theCUBE bringing data to you here live from Las Vegas at Dell EMC World 2017. I'm John Furrier with Paul Gillin. Back with more, stay with us after the short break. (lively music)