(upbeat music)
>> Hello, and welcome to theCUBE special coverage
of Sapphire Now we're here in Palo Alto.
Sapphire now SAPs premier conference in Orlando.
We are in Palo Alto, we have folks on the ground in Orlando.
Special three days of wall-to-wall coverage.
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
Taking you through all the action
from our new studio in Palo Alto, 4,500 square feet.
Our chance to cover events when we can't get there in person
we certainly can cover it from here.
And that's what we're going to be doing
for the next three days; we're going to have stories
on the ground, no story is too small.
We're going to chase 'em all down.
We have people calling in, we have folks on the ground
that'll be Skyping in, calling in,
whatever it takes to get the story out to you,
we're going to do it and, certainly,
expert coverage from inside the studio here.
We got George Gilbert from Wikibon
and a variety of folks who did not make it to Orlando
will be coming into Palo Alto to sit down and talk with us.
I'm John Furrier, my co-host is Jeff Frick.
Jeff, we'll do whatever it takes.
We'll cover from our studio, we'll go to Orlando virtually
we got the Twitter hashtag, Sapphirenow, we're on that.
We have folks on the ground, a lot of great news
coming out of Sapphire.
>> What do ya think?
I mean, you were just as Dell EMC World
last week and the story was all about, kind of,
hybrid cloud and customer choice and it sounds like
that's a recurring theme here at SAP,
where they've got a lot of cloud options
based on what their customer wants to do.
>> I mean, if you, I mean this sounds really
bad to say for someone who follows the tech industry
but I just think this digital transformation thing
is just over-played.
But it's the, it's the Groundhog's Day moment.
The movie just keeps replaying itself.
Digital transformation, digital transformation,
and, again, just like every other commerce,
like Dell EMC World and every other one,
digitally transforming your business is the theme.
Little bit played, I would say business transformation
is, I would say, the next chapter of what's happening
and what you see from these shows.
Specifically, at Dell EMC World, US ServiceNow,
OpenStack, all the different events,
Red Hat's been the one we been going to
this past couple weeks is the business impact
of the technology and SAP highlights that
with their results and their keynotes
in the news letter drops today,
which is, look it, they have been doing SAP
for all the top companies powering with SAP. As in Oracle.
But now the customers want to go beyond the legacy SAP.
And this has been a challenge for SAP
over the past five years.
They've had all the right messaging,
digital dashboards, real time for business, all there.
But the problem was they were missing a big piece of it.
That is a cloud native and really aligning with
the explosive growth of cloud computing, cloud native.
Which is the new application developer.
This new class of developer is emerging
and that's different than the in-house SAP guys,
by the way, which is still a massive market.
>> Sure. >> That's the big trend.
And of course, machine learning, AI,
the kinds of design tooling that you'd expect
to see, they're calling that Leonardo.
>> I think it really shows the power of the consumer
and the impact that the big public clouds
have had on the marketplace, right?
With Google, and with Amazon,
especially Microsoft, as well, coming into play.
And I think it's, what's interesting
on the SAP tact is they have their own cloud.
But now they've, you know, are very aggressively
following up on an earlier announcement
at Google Cloud Platform Show.
With more announcements at this show
and then they continue to strengthen
their relationship with Amazon.
So, it's a pretty interesting place,
if you're an SAP customer,
really having options around where,
what cloud and what cloud deployment
is really no longer an argument.
You've got a lot of options at SAP,
very different than Oracle,
which is still pretty much exclusively
Oracle on the Oracle cloud.
Very different kind of a tact.
>> Yeah and just reading the hard news from
from hitting the ground today down in Orlando
is the key points, I'll just summarize it real quick.
Expanded SAP Leonardo, Digital Innovation System,
SAP Google Expand the Strategic Partnership,
SAP Cloud Platform accelerates adoption
and proves choice advances consumption for customers.
That, essentially, is it.
And there's a lot of other subtext going on
on Enterprise Cloud, a lot of other massive pockets.
But in terms of top-level news,
it's Leonardo, okay?
Leonardo Da Vinci, dead, creative genius. Okay?
But that is all about providing the tools
for business to be successful in a digital world.
But to me, the big story, Jeff,
is the transformation of what used to be called
HANA Cloud Platform to SAP Cloud Platform.
This is their platform as a service
bet around winning the new developers, the cloud native.
Last year at Sapphire, we actually had theCUBE on the ground
they announced a deal with Apple computer
around iOS and developers.
That, now, has chip as a general availability
so you're seeing SAP bringing two worlds together.
The Cloud Native World, which they never played in much
to the SAP Eco System, which is flush with cash.
There's a ton of money to be made in that world.
The install base is massive, now you have
Cloud-Computing Hybrid Cloud with
the HANA Cloud Platform, I mean the SAP Cloud Platform
to bring that in.
Again, I still can't even get it right.
>> And so, let's just break it down
as simply as you can, John.
Why do they change the name?
And what exactly do they have today?
>> Well, here's the first of all problem.
I'm so used to saying HANA because they have been
branding HANA on >> They been bangin' HANA
for the decade, or forever. >> It's just like, in my brain.
I just can't get it out. SAP HANA, so anytime,
and they actually called it HANA Cloud Platform before.
>> Right, right. >> But HANA is such
a massive set of capabilities that they really wanted
to break out the platform as a service,
which is the Cloud Native play,
where all the action is for developers.
From HANA, a viable product that they have
that everyone's using.
So, they have two clouds that we can say.
SAP Cloud Platform, that's in Cloud Native,
and then, HANA Enterprise Cloud.
One's a delivery mechanism and one's
a developer environment; it's the way
I like to think about it.
I'm a HANA customer, I'm going to need Enterprise Cloud
to take my HANA solution and extend it up
with self-service or provisioning,
some partnership with AWS Google
and the different clouds, getting my legacy HANA
Enterprise software to be cloud enabled.
That's HANA Enterprise Cloud.
SAP Cloud Platforms for folks who don't,
who like DevOps, the Cloud Native world
that we cover deeply.
>> Okay, and then, how do you look at the
kind of Google partnership, Google Cloud Platform
versus AWS partnership.
SAP's goin' dual-track,
is it just simply to have choice based on
what their customers, are they fundamentally
different relationships? How do you read that?
>> This is where I think SAP's got genius going on.
But if they might screw it up
because they can't get out of their own way.
>> Jeff: Can't use genius anymore,
we've had enough geniuses. >> So, so, this could be
a brilliant strike of move for SAP.
I think it's a brilliant move in
the way they're playing it out.
But, again, like I said, SAP,
they might not be able to get out of their own way.
That's going to be their issue.
But from a functionality standpoint,
this multi-cloud opportunity;
they've been with Amazon for many many years.
They announced a partnership with Google
which is just kind of toe in the water.
That's tryin' to advance pretty quickly.
Not a lot of meat on the bone there.
And Azure relationships.
So, SAP wants to put their cloud platform,
that platform as a service,
in all the different major clouds
so that their legacy can work on pram
and in whichever cloud the customer chooses.
>> Yeah, I think there is, >> I think, that is a
multi-cloud strategy that is viable for SAP.
Unlike, say, Oracle, which isn't multi-cloud,
it's Oracle Cloud. >> Right, right, right.
>> So, you know the SAP Oracle, you know,
head-to-head thing has been kind of, like,
taking completely different paths.
Someone will be right. >> Right.
But I think there's more meat on the bone
with the Google thing than, maybe,
maybe we know of, or are aware of, or whatever.
I mean, Burnt did come and get in the keynote
with Diane Greene at Google Cloud Platform.
And, you know, I think it's relatively significant.
What'll be interesting to see how it shapes out and,
again, what are the customer choices that are going to
drive them to Amazon or to SB Cloud or to the Google cloud.
I guess at the end of the day it's about choice
and I know that was a big theme at Dell EMC World.
Is that everyone has to cater to the choice
of the customer or else it's just too easy for them
to flip a lot of these other clouds.
>> I mean, when I say, "not ready for primetime,"
I mean, Google's got a lot of work to do.
SAP as a company is not as far down the road
with Google as they are with Amazon and Azure,
just to make my point clear. >> Okay.
>> But the do have our announcing
additional certifications of the coinnovation
between SAP and Google.
Between SAP Cloud Platform and Google Cloud Platform.
IOT, machine learning, they certified SAP NetWeaver
in a variety of S4 HANA, business warehousing;
essentially more market place
to accelerate the digital transformation.
And, again, this is all about SAP co-locating in Google.
>> Right, right. >> If a customer wants to
take advantage of TensorFlow and all
the goodness of, say, Google.
That's a good move for SAP and, again,
I think this is a brilliant strategy for SAP
if they don't screw it up. >> Right, right.
And potentially, that's the bridge to,
like you said, it's been a little bit of
Groundhog Day with cloud, cloud, cloud.
But what's really the theme of 2017
is AI machine learning
and it's an interesting bridge with Google Cloud,
to their TensorFlow
as another way to bring AI machine learning
into the application learning into the application.
>> So, Jeff, we've been covering a lot of events.
One comment, I will say, is that SAP
always has great messaging.
>> I got to say, because we've been covering
out eighth year covering Sapphire Now.
We've only missed, like, two years over that time span.
It's a lot like Oracle on the sense
that it's a very business oriented event,
but they have good pulse.
Bill McDermott, great communicator,
great customer-focused person.
Always has his hand on the pulse.
They have great messaging.
And they tend to pick the right waves.
And they've had some false starts with cloud,
they've bought, had some acquisitions,
things been cobbled together, but they've never wavered
from their mission.
And the mission has always been powering
the speed of business, great software solutions.
The issue is, they're moving off of SAP
to new cloud solutions, so SAP is taking
a proactive strike to say, look here,
we can play in the cloud, therefore this multi-cloud game
is critical for the growth of SAP, in my opinion.
>> How much of the SAP in cloud
will be new greenfield opportunities,
or people want the flexibility, and a lot
of the attributes of cloud versus, they're not migrating
old R3 instances into the cloud.
I mean, this is, I would assume, mainly new
greenfield opportunities.
>> Well, I think it's both.
I mean, I think you have greenfield developers
basically that are being hired by their customers
to build apps, top line driven apps,
and also, you know, some consolidation apps.
But mainly, you know, their customers are hiring developers.
Hey, we need a mobile app for our business,
so you need to have data,
you need to have some domain expertise.
But at the end of the day, the system of records
probably stored in some SAP system somewhere.
So what they're trying to do is decouple
the dependency between that developer,
but still use SAP, but and offer an extension of SAP.
It really is an opportunity, in my mind,
for that to happen, and also partners.
Look at Accenture, Capgemini, all these different partners.
They are poised to create some great value
and make some cash along the way.
Remember the minicomputer boom.
People who lined their pockets with cash
were the integrators.
The large global system integrators.
So I think that, and the channel partners
are going to have a great opportunity
to take advantage of preexisting legacy accounts
and to grow them further.
>> Well, they certainly have a giant ecosystem.
There's no doubt about it.
It's one of the startup challenges
that, new company starters to build that ecosystem.
I mean, they have a giant ecosystem.
So, what are you looking for this week
besides the obvious announcement?
And kind of tells that you want to see
to let you know that SAP continues to be on track
and move with the shifting tides of the market trends?
>> Well do me, I'm looking at the multi-cloud story.
It's a good story.
Not sure how baked it is,
but from a story standpoint, I really like it.
I think that whoever can really crack the code
on multi-cloud in a viable way is going to be a winner.
So to me, I'm going to be looking heavily
at the multi-cloud stuff coming out of Orlando.
I'm interested to see how the developer traction pans out.
I'm really interested in following up
on the Apple relationship and see how that pans out.
And then ultimately, how the rest of SAP
can transform as a business.
Because SAP tends to have a lot of buzzwords,
a lot of word salad, not a lot of, you know,
breaking it down and orchestrating.
So to me, SAP, where I'm critical of them is,
they kind of can't get out of their own way, Jeff.
So, sometimes they kind of get caught
in that old world thinking when the world is moving
very very fast.
Look at Amazon Web Services,
you look at what Google's doing,
you look at where Vmware is changing.
Vmware started Pat Gelsinger.
He was in the dumps in 2016, now he's flying high.
He went from almost being fired,
stock had a 52 week low, to them soaring.
They have a market cap that's greater than HPE.
So these old incumbent like SAP,
they have to transform their culture, get relevant,
and get real.
And if they can't show the proof points
with customer wins and partners, and multi-cloud,
then they're going to be on shaky ground.
So that's what I'm looking for.
>> Jeff: All right, so should be a good week.
I'm looking forward to it.
>> Okay, we are here in the Palo Alto studio,
our new 4,500 square foot operation.
We can do coverage here, and then have
on the ground coverage of which we will be doing all week
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
for our SAP Sapphire Now.
We've got great guests coming in, great editorial coverage.
I want to thank our sponsors, SAP,
for, you know, allowing us to do this
and continuing theCUBE tradition at Sapphire Now.
I'm John Furrier with Jeff Frick.
More coming after this short break.