>>Mhm Yes. Hi lisa Martin here with the cube we are covering Dell technologies world, the digital event experience. I have two guests here with me today that are new to the program. So I would like to welcome David Lowe, the Director of product management for Dell Technologies. David. Welcome to the >>program. Hi, how are you >>doing well? And Catherine Ward is here as well, customer experience strategist at Dell Technologies Catherine, it's great to have you join us. Thanks. Happy to be here lisa. So we're talking about embracing as a service. That was a big announcement at Dell Technologies World as we were talking before we went live just a few months ago in the end of 2020 where the new Dell Technologies cloud console was announced. David start with our audience in terms of describing the apex council, what it is when it was launched and give us some color around that. >>Absolutely. Back in october we announced the Dell Technologies cloud console as part of unveiling the apex vision and this was really uh in response to what we heard from our customers about the need to be able to take advantage of cloud and as a service, operating models, being able to take advantage of our products and services around infrastructure in a way that really uh you know, met their needs in terms of the business results that they were trying to drive the kind of flexibility that they needed about how to get those offerings in place and be able to to run them having simplicity and how they managed those offers while also having just a greater degree of control, of course, that's afforded by having infrastructure running on premises versus uh in the public cloud. So with the apex console today, again, we're just listening to what customers say about being able to double down on that vision and provide even more functionality and capabilities on top of additional services that we're making available in the apex console today, >>Captain, let's get some point of view from the customers. David mentioned them a number of times. Obviously this is why you're doing this, but how does apex designed to help simplify operations? What are some of the things that you're hearing from the customer experience about it being able to simplify ops? >>Yeah, absolutely. So we've we've talked to many customers that's part of my team's job to ensure we're delivering a great experience. We've really heard >>that customers >>appreciate that they can now subscribe to services and and that the Dell offers. Um we've heard a lot from customers and sales folks that tells us that not every project they want to do is funded in a complex way. And so one of the great benefits of Dell clouds offers and the apex console is being able to get things in an op X way so they can pay on a subscription, uh sorry, so they can play on a subscription basis uh to meet, you know, their business needs is one major positive that we've been hearing from customers. >>One of the things that I read when apex launched a few months ago was this really as a way to demonstrate cloud as an operating model rather than a destination and lets you get both of your opinions on that and since launched what you thought, David, we'll start with you. >>Yeah, Well that's it's a great it's a great concept that customers really that really resonates with customers. So I mean, you know, cloud as an operating model has been something that many companies have moved towards over the last, you know, 10, 15 years, where there are fundamental characteristics of cloud that are defined as being on demand, being self service, providing easier access with elastic scale and then also just paying for what you use. And and and these are the things that customers really care about. And so as part of the apex vision and unveiling today in the in the apex console where offering services, for example, like apex storage services, where customers will have the ability to subscribe to that service on demand through the Apex Council in a self service way, they'll be able to take advantage of it in a way they pay for what they use because on top of a a committed storage capacity, it's an on demand usage model, uh and they have the ability to come in at any time and increase as their business demands what storage is available to them. So we really are capitalizing on those cloud characteristics that customers want to be able to take advantage of but doing so, you know, on top of uh, infrastructure products from Dell that customers have trusted for decades. >>Right. So one of the things that we've talked about so many times in the last year is the acceleration that we've seen in every industry with perspective digital transformation and seeing so many businesses in every industry pivot multiple times here. And that speed up, you know, like, you know, here we are using SAS applications to communicate and to reach customers. I'd love to know Katherine, what some of the things are that you've learned since the initial launch. Kind of given the interesting times that we're in, what are some of the things that you've learned from customer feedback that are going to be utilized to help uh, uh, kind of modify the product going forward? >>Yeah, absolutely. So one thing is customers echoing David, really value self serve. They want to be able to do things on their time when they want. And one of the great things that customers can do through the console is build solutions, choose services that best meet their needs, they don't have to involve sales, they obviously can if they want to, but they don't have to. And that is a big selling point key, you know, meets a key need of that. We've heard from customers, I'd say. The second thing that we've heard from folks is that they really like how we have set up our role based access >>and identity >>management capabilities. Uh and I'll give you an example, So there are company very large companies, let's say who may have one finance department and they are the only people who are empowered to sign off on orders, let's say. So maybe a more purchaser type role, you may have an entire separate set of folks who are more technical folks who understand how to configure an offer, how to put it all together and those, but those folks can't buy. Um And so we have built in some workflows um to help support those processes that we've heard from customers that they have, and by doing that they can ensure appropriate separation of duties according to their internal policies as well as help them get a handle on unexpected spend from I. T. Services. >>Catherine is really touching on an incredibly important point there that customers over the last 10 years as they've used cloud services from other providers. We know that the democratization of cloud, that said that anybody can come in off the street with a credit card and start using services. That's a great way for people to get up and running. But that also leads to the problem of shadow I. T. It also leads to uh you know, an unbounded expenses and and you know difficulty in managing costs and unpredictable expenditure. So we've seen over time how even other cloud providers have had to come back laser and based on customer feedback, start adding governance, start adding policies, start adding, you know budget management and spend controls, uh Start ensuring that the kind of workflow that Catherine mentioned is in place around uh you know, ordering And we decided to put that in just from day 1. So when customers come to the apex console, they're going to be coming in the context of a company or an organization where there will be users that have specific roles. And as Catherine mentioned, they'll have specific permissions that might align with their particular job function and there will be governance that an administrator can implement to ensure that only certain people can perform certain tasks, which, you know, we already know from customer feedback is incredibly important to give customers that kind of control that they might not get or that they might have been asking for from other cloud providers in order to ensure that this is truly like an enterprise grade level of servants. >>Yeah. And just to play off that David, you know, I've talked also while I also, I talked to customers a lot also make sure I interact quite a bit with our sales team so to get their views as well. And there's a university customer that we have who has this exact problem of shadow it. And they were, their goal was to unify and get all their main campuses on same system, following same policies, same procedures, same infrastructure. Um And one of the key challenges that they have is people, developers get excited, they want to build stuff and they will go to the public cloud, use a credit card for example and just get up and running. And now this company realizes that a those folks kind of going off and doing some of that on their own are actually spending more than their central it spends. So again I think it's a real world problem that we think we're we're well positioned to solve. >>Yeah, those guardrails seem really outstanding for customers to be able to get that. You both mentioned shadow I. T. And that's one of the things that we know so easy to spin up services. But yet you then disconnect I thi from different business units which is always a challenge for organizations. So having the governance and the role based access controls really provides your customers with more of a chance to, as you said I think a minute ago David consume and only pay for what they're consuming but also have that line of sight that visibility across who's using these services. What are we paying? Are we are we getting what we need and are we ensuring that we're getting more control over our environment? I can't even imagine how much more important that is these days with so many people still scattered and remote. >>Yeah and and and and and and it's it's just really part of the whole customer lifecycle as they work with our services. So after customer is able to subscribe to something like apex data storage services and after it has been deployed at their data center they'll be able to come in to the apex council, they'll be able to see information about that subscription and about the infrastructure that they're running including having health monitoring and alerts and be able to see the capacity usage of that service. Uh And with that telemetry and insight then be able to take action. Uh Perhaps as you say to you know either uh you know put in place additional controls within their teams on on spending or consumption or increase the available storage that they have to ensure that it meets uh their business needs. And and as we build out this end and life cycle within the apex console customers will see more and more features coming to help with you know tagging of expenditure for show back purpose is to simplify the way in which uh you know both I. T. Teams and financial uh personnel within a company are able to ensure that they're being responsible and and have that governance over over what's being consumed and spent. >>Yeah. Absolutely critical. Catherine talked to us about for existing Dell customers, how can they access the apex console? What's the what's the process there that you advise? >>Yeah. Great great question. So the good news is if you already have a Dell account, whether you're an existing premier customer or perhaps you visit us through Dell dot com your credentials will work. All you need to do is talk to your sales team, your sales representative and ask them to be enabled and the process typically goes that they will sales will help enable an administrator and from there the administrator at your company can start giving access and assigning those roles as as as you as you need. >>Just a little bit of a pivot on that. And what are we talking about in terms of time frame when we think of cloud services being able to spend them up knowing that there's still so much remote work going on. How quickly can Adele customer follow that process that you just mentioned and activate these services? >>Yeah, that's a great question. So our goal is to be able to, once, you know, we have your interest, we understand what you want to get you equipment and get you up and running within 14 days is our is our goal and our target. Um It's a lot depends on on what the customer needs and if they can get, you know, if they can accept delivery that quickly and all that. But but that is our that's our goal is get you up and running in 14 days. >>Excellent. That time to values David. Go ahead. >>Oh yeah, the the getting access to the council can be can be can be, you know, certainly a lot faster. But as Catherine said, you know, once you get into the console and you want to be able to consume the services, especially for those infrastructure services that are going to show up and be deployed at your data center. Uh You know, we we include features like integrated site survey that customers are going to see shortly when they're able to go through the subscription process and enter information about their physical data center. Maybe uh you know, physical access characteristics or power or networking configurations that they have So that our deployment services team knows what to expect when they show up. We can get everything wrapped and stacked and ready to go put it on the truck and have it uh you know, to the customer as quickly as possible as Catherine said, with the time to value promise of 14 days. >>Excellent. And that fast access last question David, before we wrap up, talk to us about what's next? This was only announced in the last 67 months so lots of Development and progress, lots of customer feedback helping to tune the services. What can customers expect you know going out the rest of 20 calendar year 2021 >>more. Just I mean you know we'll have access for more customers in more countries to be able to consume more services and more capabilities within the console to provide that richer and to end experience today we already have access Uh for the console within 17 countries around the world with customers from the US and. UK. and France and Germany already able to subscribe to certain services. We have access for apex data storage services and other countries uh Coming very soon. Uh So we'll be adding more countries or languages will be adding more services uh in the coming months. And as we alluded to earlier more capabilities to ensure that the end and experience that customers have crosses all of the different boundaries within their organizations and supports all of the different roles who need to be able to come in and do everything from discover services. Subscribe to them, provision, resources, uh manage, operate support and and and build solutions on on top of what they have. So it really is all about ensuring that it's a single consistent and to end life cycle within the apex console. >>Well, that word more was perfect when I said, what's coming next book? And folks expect more? It's like that. But wait, there's >>more. So I'm sure >>folks will will get a lot more information as the event unfolds in the weeks after David and Catherine. Thank you for joining me talking to me about all of the progress that's happened in such a short amount of time with apex concept. We look forward to seeing what's next. >>Thanks lisa. >>Thanks for having us. >>My pleasure for David Lo and Catherine Ward. I'm lisa martin. You're watching the cubes coverage of Dell technologies world, The virtual event experience. Yeah, yeah.