good morning everyone and welcome back to the cubes live coverage of Neta converge I'm your host Rebecca Knight sitting alongside my co-host and analyst Rob stretche Rob we're here at the MGM the room is starting to fill up we're feelingthe buzz yeah Ithink again it's really about this kickoff for the year and getting the year in their fy2 started and really all of these announcements that were made today are just really Best in Class and how that's going to help really Propel through the year the momentum that net apppp saw in 2024 as well exactly well a great we have a great new guest to talk more about this we have Gabby boo she is the chief marketing officer here at netup thank you so much for coming on I am so happy to be here fresh from the main stage so wehave a lot to get into today but let's start by talking about AI because companies are feeling the pressure to EXP accelerate Innovation and um adopt datadriven decision- making how do net app Solutions help businesses Embrace andalso get what they want extract the value from AI yeah you know net Up's been in AI for a while now actually uh we have embedded AI in a lot of our tools um blue XP which is a good control plane where you're monitoring your ransomware some of our Cloud op Solutions where you're able to kind of optimize your flow in between the cloud um there's it'sliterally everywhere um I think what we're excited about is the opportunity that gen brings to that not for our products so to speak but for our customers workloads as they think about how to manage their data management how to think about data more completely and to allow gen workloads and use cases to really start to kind of bring those to life in a much more cost effective and secure way so we're excited all aspects of AI specifically geni right now so Ithink as people who follow net apppp I think part of it is that you guys did a brand refresh last year yeah now you have even more coming out today take us through kind of howyou're thinking about this and that how that really the brand because it's all ontap underthe hood but really these different form factors and different approaches yeah you know I really think that when we sat and looked at what we wanted our brand to be we wanted to really go back to Legacy and not be so far forward that we felt that maybe out of touch or Out Of Reach but we didn't want to go so far back that people stopped thinking of us in all these other areas that we've been experimenting in and innovating in um so what it was really important to us is to redefine some of the language we Ed you saw that today with our announcement um around the new AF Series right we're redefining unified to be more than just a protocol but to be how you are integrated unified can be so much more than that anydata any workload any place we have the same principles on how we were dealing with AI which we wanted to talk about wedidn't want to AI wash if I can use that we wanted to kind of give ourselves permission to insport intelligence because we felt thatwas part of our Legacy of innovation so intelligence was big there so you kind of get that we're redefining infrastructure to be on preman in the cloud new unified storage we're redefining intelligence but at the core of that is data we really came out of this saying it's about our customers data that's what we're here for we're here to protect it we're here to optimize it we're here to go where their data goes so when you thought about those three things together that gave us intelligent data infrastructure and I think it gives us forward momentum Innovation as well as that Legacy we talked about so I mean we're going to continue to talk about the future and looking forward because it's not just a brand refresh it's actually what's going on at the company it's sort of the outward marketing and positioning but also what's really happening underneath the hood so what do you see as the role of intelligent data infrastructure how do you see it involving at net app and then what are some of the major next steps yeah I so I'll break it down by saying data infrastructure is something that everybody is thinking about because the amount of data everybody has right it's increasing the complexity that comes with that clearly the cost that comes with their increasing amounts of data so I we thought about data infrastructure we knew that it could evolve with us and with our customers needs I don't know what our customers needs are tomorrow but I know that they're going to continue to have data needs so I really think that data infrastructure isthegrounding if you will of what we want to be committed to for our customers if you start to think about how it has grown for us it almost is like a holy cow we were always here we were always doing that when I went out to customers and partners and analysts and even people who didn't notice are like yeah you were always here and yeah I am thinking about this because our data is as close to being a product as a product is so I I'm excited about the future of data infrastructure especially net op's intelligent data infrastructure because it is the new product I think and I think customers will continue to just say we want to evolve with you and we want to help you evolve it the storyline yeah Ithink what has been really interesting ingetting prepared for this wesaw that you had your Cloud complexity report and there was the IDC AI maturity model you know we do our own research but we think that like again looking at everybody's cuz all these data points are really pointing in very interesting directions and I think for the customers how did you see the data coming out of the cloud complexity report you know I think it was really interesting because we started off with a cloud complexity report and then because of the rise of AI and because we relaunched ourbrand it was like all of this other new data was just kind of yes that'ssaying the exact same thing we're thinking I think the AI components were super interesting because people were linking their progression um whether they were a data lagered with being an AI lagger and I think thatis what is really telling in that cloud complexity report right as you think about where your data is going you have to think about what tools are you going to use for that are you going to use continue to use the cloud do you need to optimize that with AI and so what I love about us doing surveys and data profiles like that is if we really are committed to data then showcasing and telling that story with data is the best thing because our customers clearly some analysts too coming back to us and saying this is cool we love this give us more data and we'll be better partners with you so I like kind of like thatrub no I mean Iagain I went through itwas like 37 pages long or something which I thought was fantastic because there's so much good data in there like you said around AI not just Cloud complexity and wekind of look at it from a research perspective is cloud is an operating model yep not a place and I think on tap definitely that's on tap I mean it's all over the place Edge it's core it's on Prem it's in the cloud at the hyperscalers and even with the partners like you have here that do Colo one of the things I thought was really interesting in there was also was like some of the things where like sustainability took a step down but people were also saying here's where I'm stealing budget froman AI perspective it wasn't about the data still was where they were investing how did you see and how do you see the partners really leaning into this that are here today and really taking that and saying hey this is how we're going to move forward yeah I think that the most important part of any good company is their ecosystem andclearly our ecosystem we've tried to broaden it it'swe've got strong partnerswho are able to build the kinds of workloads and use cases that customers are going to need we have a strong Alliance network ofIntegrations that are deep into our ontap base and then we have those hyperscalers you talked about where again it's like it's built in I like that term builtin because when you think about the entirety of that ecosystem what you're really seeing is we're not just going and doing Point solution or separate solution boltons we are literally building that functionality into every single one of their environments every single one of our environments so that they can be successful and that's really where our partners are starting tolean and say I want to build this workload this use keys I was just over here the other day with wwt who showcased we did this with on top this with your AFF and this with I can't remember what else it was really loud but theysaid this is a workload that we're running on net app and we couldn't do that without you so I think about intelligent data infrastructure as that ecosystem it's bolstered by that ecosystem and it is built in so that everybody in that ecosystem can really bring the advantages to the data for the customers otherwise we're just a pile of bolt-ons and that's nobody wants that right so I love that our ecosystem is happy yeah andI think even in those announcements that you had today it had wide ranging for data protection and cyber resilience and like you said built in right built not built on not sidecar not things like that do you see that as really one of the strengths and you know really things that you're leaning I mean George was talking about it even just a minute ago it's it seems to be one of the strengths that everybody's trying to copy in the market around Net apppp is hey it's built in versus built on and you know again some are more successful than others about doing that but nobody's been as successful as net apppp in that Ithink it's a key to our success absolutely I think uh a lot of people engineer a platform by saying I'm going to build a platform and then it's about building the platform and then maybe fixing or applying disperate Acquisitions or products and trying to make that fit your perfect base what I love about netop is that we built all of these things even though they were built separately we knew that they needed to be integrated and built in all of the functionality needed to be there so it's almost like we've been building this very intricate accessible data platform for over a decade and now it's just kind of like when our competitors see there it's like oh maybe we should have done it that way which I love right because that's really whatwe are we are thisprofound data infrastructure this platform if you want to use that word that's focused on how to bring the right things to our customers and doing the right thing with our data and you don't do that by thinking in a silo of this product and then oh gosh I got to go integrate those right so I want to get into that a little bit more because I mean a technology company is only as good as its ecosystem and so how are you working with customers to determine what their problems will be tomorrow and make sure that you have the Sol solutions thatcan that can help them overcome those challenges and hurdles that they're facing yeah we've got a couple of different things obviously we do what everybody does I'm not going to you know pride of ownership we do ebcs we do customer advisory boards we do partner advisory boards but I think what we really like about our approach is that it's constant right when we're in the trial stage or we're in the alpha or beta stage it's not the first time the customers are seeing it quite frankly it's because a customer asked for it it's because a partner said I'm at a customer I need an next so we really you know instead of just saying it as a platitude we really embrace it and say we're thinking about this ecosystem what do you think and then we go off and we make sure it fits into the road map and I think that makes it great I think the other thing that we think about quite frankly is what are your use cases or workloads working for you how do we bring those in you've already spent the time on them how do we make them more apparent and more obvious and accessible to everybody else so we really try to build that level of community as well so you know it'sgot to be more than a platitude it's youreally have to live it soI'llask a question because Ithink that we were talking with George about this and he actually had agreat line about not AI washing now you're in marketing and how hard was it to not try to AI wash everything actually her line I'mjust going to the record it was baby's line well but I mean how hard is it to not cuz there's so much noise out in the market and everybody's like I mean even some of the stuff George was talking about with metadata and things like that there's a lot of things you can lean into and a lot of Technology there you know I it was very tempting andwhen you're rebuilding messaging and narrative there is why we didn't make it a campaign right we wanted to really get back to our core to our gut store story and by the way my boss is a great Advocate when he picks up on something he goes with it so if he wants AI watch then I'll give it to him but everybody had an opinion everybody I think we started with like a thousand words andputting them together andthere were some that Rose to the top that everybody was very passionate about but one of the things we very clearly said we don't want to repeat themistakes that we've made from the past ourother messaging has been great it's been solid it's definitely put us in a position to be successful but I think sometimes it got maybe a little bit forward of where the market and where the customer was um when we talked about data fabric is really smart and it's still embedded in what we do but we got a little too far forward on our skis same with Cloud we embraced it before all of our competitors did but we got a little too far forward and our customers were like we're not there yet so I think we were really focused on saying this story has to be true to us and we need words that signify we know that this is going in the market but we don't want to be like everybody else who has now put AI or aai or something in their narrative we already know we've been here for a decade we already know where we're going let's just be confident in the story that we're going to tell and if we are embedding Ai and um in kind of how we talk about it and Building Products they'll pick up on it and they'll appreciate the fact that we didn't wash it Gabby how do you describe your overarching strategy as the CMO of net apppp in terms of how you you're driven to solidify your position in this very competitive market yeah oh wow um verycompetitive I respect all of my fellow CMOS they are veryum hard acts tocompete with however I do believe that What Makes Us strong is by being focused and prioritized um that brand narrative has been the basis of how we think about doing demand how obviously here today and for the next couple of days how we're training our salese the less messages that come at them the less kind of things that you'rethrowing at them the more compelling you can actually be so my strategy is really less is quite honestly more um andI want to get the less right I want it to be resonant and I want to make sure that everybody in the company who are my best brand ambassadors can feel that empowered andthatcompelling when they go tell that story it's true with accessorizing it's true with data infrastructure less is more thank you so much gab a real pleasure having you on the cube thanks for having me thank you I'm Rebecca Knight for Rob stretch I stay tuned for more of the Cub's live coverage of net app converge you're watching the cube the leader in technology Enterprise coverage