>> Narrator: From Miami Beach, Florida,
it's theCUBE covering Acronis Global Cyber Summit 2019.
Brought to you by Acronis.
>> Hello everyone, welcome back to theCUBE's coverage
of Acronis Global Cyber Summit 2019.
I'm John Furrier here in Miami Beach.
Our next guest is Pat Hurley, Vice President
General Manager of the Americas in sales
and customer relationships, good to have you on.
>> Thanks for having me, welcome to Miami Beach.
Lovely place to have an event.
>> So I hear you got a lot of competition going on
between the US Americas and EMIA teams.
It's a very competitive group here.
>> The European team is very confident.
I think we'll show them tomorrow what we're made of.
We've been recruiting very hard
for some players that are Latin American.
I think we'll show them a thing or two.
>> You got a big soccer story there.
>> We do, yeah.
We've got a few sports partnerships that we have
across the globe.
Some of the first partnerships we have
were actually within Formula 1
and we really try to correlate the story
of the importance of data protection
and cyber protection in the sporting industry
because a lot of people don't think about the amount of data
that's actually being generated on the space.
A Formula 1 car generates between two and three terabyte,
two and three gigabytes of data on every lap.
It's tons of telemetry devices
that are collecting information from the car,
from the road service, from the general environment.
They're taking that data
and then sending it back to the headquarter,
analyzing it, making very small improvements to the car
to make sure that they can qualify faster, run faster lap,
make the right type of angle into a turn
which can really differentiate them
from being first, second, third, 10th
in a qualifying session.
On the soccer side, we do have some partnerships
with Arsenal, Manchester City, Inter Milan,
and we just signed a partnership as well with Liverpool,
so we are very popular in that space.
Here, in the U.S., we have some other sports
that we are big fans of. (laughs)
I'm personally a big Boston Red Sox fan
being a Boston native,
and we do have a sports partnership with the Red Sox
which has been an unbelievable partnership with them
and learning more about the use cases
that they saw using our technology has been really cool.
>> You know, Pat, you bring up the sports thing
and we were kidding before we were on camera
around the trading, how people do sports deals,
and they trade merchandise for consumer benefit
or customer benefits but really, what's happening
is sports team encapsulate really the digital transformation
in a nutshell because most sports franchises aren't,
have been traditionally behind,
but now with the consumerization of IT and digital,
you can go back to 2007 since the mobile phone, really.
I mean it's iPhone. >> Yeah.
>> Since that time sports encapsulates every aspect of it.
Consumer, business, fan experience,
and it really has almost every element
of what we see now as a global IoT problem opportunity.
So, it really encapsulates the use case of an integrated
and needed solution.
>> Oh yeah, absolutely, I mean,
if you think about the amount of data that's out there today
and the fast way that it's growing,
the explosion of data in the world today,
sports team have different unique challenges.
Obviously, they have large fan bases
that need to be able to access the data
and understand what's going on
with their favorite sports teams.
For us, it's really these technology partnerships
we have with these guys.
It runs through all these different areas of,
in many cases, we didn't really understand
what they were using it for.
So the Red Sox for example, they've got Fenway Park,
an iconic stadium, the mecca of baseball.
If you haven't been there yet,
I'd suggest all your viewers that they go and check it out.
Give me a call.
We'll try and get you set-up there.
But the experience that the fans have there
is all around their data experience there, right?
And it's not just baseball games.
It could be hockey games at Fenway Park.
It could be a concert that they're having at Fenway Park.
There's a lot of different events.
These stadiums are open year-round,
and the ability to move, share, access,
and protect the data that's in that stadium
is really important to how they're functioning
as an organization.
We talk to their IT team quite regularly
about how they're using our solutions.
They're talking about different aspects
of artificial intelligence, different ways they can use
our products in machine learning.
Obviously, with the new solutions that we have
in the market today around cyber security
are helping them to address other challenges
that they face as an organization.
These are real-time challenges.
>> And they have physical locations,
national security issues,
terrorist attacks that could happen at their venues.
They're public gathering places too.
>> Absolutely.
We announced our partnership with them back in May
and I was shocked to hear them on the main stage
announcing that they had
this great partnership with Acronis.
It's talking about their unique cyber security needs.
They started talking about drone technology,
and I'm thinking, all right, a drone flies into a stadium,
maybe it breaks and it falls on a player,
and we're paying $20 million for one of these pictures
to be out there on a hill or it injures a fan,
or maybe they're collecting some video data
that then share it out, and that's Red Sox's IP.
No, they're talking about cyber security threats
in the sense that a drone,
a remotely controlled device could come in
and light an incendiary device in the stadium,
and that to them is a real security concern,
and that's frontline for the IT guys.
That's what keeps them up at night.
>> Yeah, and that's really an attack, big time.
>> Oh yeah, absolutely.
>> What are the use cases that are coming out
of some of your customers?
'Cause guys have a unique, integrated solution
with the platform.
There's an end-to-end component to you.
You have a holistic view on data which is interesting
and unique.
People are kind of figuring this out
but you guys are ahead of the game.
What are some of the use cases
that you're seeing in the field with customers
that highlight the benefits of taking a holistic view
of the data?
>> Yeah, absolutely.
So, we look at it as kind of backup's dead, right?
We have combined the old world of backup
and disaster recovery
with the new world of cyber security,
and we combined that to a term
we're calling cyber protection
because it really requires an end-to-end solution
and a lot of different things need to be working properly
to prevent these attacks from happening.
And you need to be very proactive
in how you're going about that.
We address it with what we call
the Acronis cyber platform.
And what this is is a unique, multi-tier,
multi-tenant offering that's designed
specifically for service providers.
We have just under 6,000 service providers
actively selling our cyber protection solutions today
and they use this for multiple different aspects.
Usually, the beach has something like a backup.
Every company needs backup.
It's more of a commodity type solution.
There's a lot of different players in the game out there
but they take it a step further.
They use that same backup technology
to then do disaster recovery.
They can do files they can share.
They can do monitoring.
We have notary solutions
based on blockchain technologies.
Now this whole suite of cyber security solutions.
All of this is with a single pane of glass,
one platform that a service provider could go in
and work with their customers in,
make sure that their data is protected,
make sure that their physical machines,
their virtual machines, their PCs, their Macs
are all protected, that data's protected,
it's secure but it's also accessible
which is an important part of it.
You can take your data, wrap it in a nice bow,
bury it a hundred feet in the ground
but then you can't use it, right?
So you want to be able to make sure that you can actually
leverage the technology there.
We've seen explosive growth especially in my market.
I think the numbers are pretty crazy.
It's something like 90% of the market today in the U.S.
is served in some capacity by a service provider,
and this could be a small or medium-sized business
that's served by a local service provider
to those really big guys that are out there--
>> Let's unpack your target audience.
You mentioned service providers multiple times.
When you're out selling your target persona,
your target audience that you're trying to reach,
is who?
>> So we touch everybody.
You equate it to kind of what we do at the Red Sox, right?
You walk into that stadium.
There's 38,000 people there.
Well, some of those people are just regular Joe's, right?
They go to work everyday.
They have a computer at home.
They have a mobile device.
They probably have multiple mobile devices.
We protect that for them.
We call 'em consumer slash pro-sumers.
We work at a lot of very large retail organizations.
If you walk into some of those shops today,
you'll be able to see our software on the shelf there.
You work with one of those tech squads
where they're starting to attach services to it
and you get more of a complete offering there.
We then scale up a little bit further
to some OEM providers.
We work with companies like Honeywell
and Amberson that are manufacturing devices
that imbed our software on there.
They white label it and deliver it out.
These are connected devices.
You think about the explosion of IoT devices
in the market today.
We're protecting that stuff as well.
We work with very large enterprises.
So, some of the major players that you see
in the manufacturing space
are standardizing on Acronis.
Process control, process automation vendors
are using Acronis and we can deliver the solution
because of the way it's so flexible
in a very consumable way for them.
Those enterprises can actually act
as a service provider for their employees.
So we can actually take our technology,
deploy the layer in their infrastructure
where they have complete control.
They may not want to be in an Uber cloud,
they might not want to work with Acronis Data Center.
They want to have and hold that data.
They want to make sure it's on-site.
We enable that type of functionality.
And then the fastest growing area for us
is what I hit on earlier
within the service provider community.
We're recruiting
hundreds of service providers every quarter.
We've got some great partners here.
>> Give me an example of a service provider.
You mentioned the Red Sox.
I'm assuming there's a vendor
that might be working within that organization.
Sounds like there's a supplier to the Red Sox.
How broad is that definition?
Give me some examples. >> Yeah,
it's a really good point.
So we work with hosting providers
that can be regional hosting providers
to multinational hosting providers.
Some of the very big names that you're probably
familiar with, we work with.
We work with Telco providers.
We work with ISV providers.
Sorry, ISP providers.
Kind of regional Telco providers.
We've provided a myriad of different services
all the way down to your kind of local mom-and-pop type
service providers where you've got a small business.
Maybe they've got 30-50 employees.
They're servicing probably 200-300 customers
and they want to provide a very secure, safe, easy-to-use,
complete solution for their customers.
Those could be focused on certain verticals.
So they could be focused on healthcare,
financial services, construction, etc.
We have some that are very niche
within like dental services or chiropractic offices,
small regional doctor's offices.
And the beauty of that,
and what I was getting with the partners earlier
is we have partnerships with companies like ConnectWise.
Those are tools that service providers are using
on a very daily basis.
>> So, essentially the platform gives you that range
in this typical platforms.
You have that broad, horizontally scalable
capability and the domain expertise
would either be with solution from you guys
or an ISV or someone within your ecosystem.
Did I get that right?
>> Absolutely, and that's what really differentiates us
is our ability to integrate into our platform
into their platform and make those connections.
So you don't need to learn
12, 14, 15 different technologies.
You've got a small suite of offerings
in a single pane of glass
very easy-to-use, very intuitive.
The integrations that we have with these partners
like ConnectWise, like Ingram Micro,
really differentiate us because what they do
is they provide open API capabilities.
They provide software development kits
where these partners can go ahead
and build it the way they want to sell it.
>> Yeah, that's interesting.
When the cloud came out and as on-premises changed here,
much more agile dev-ops kind of mindset.
That forced IT to think like a service provider.
I think like an operating system.
It's an operating environment basically
so service provider's an interesting angle.
And I wanted to get your thoughts on this
because I think this is where
you guys have such a unique opportunity
to disintegrate solution because
you could get into anything. >> Oh yeah.
>> And you got ISV's to back that up.
So I guess the question I would have is for that enterprise
that's out there that's looking to refactor,
re-platform their entire operation
or it could be a large enterprise
that has a huge IoT opportunity or challenge
or a service provider that's looking to have a solution.
What's the pitch that you would give me
if I'm one of those customers?
Say, hey Pat, what's the pitch?
>> So, you need a trusted provider
that's been in the business for a number of years
that understands the data protection and security markets.
Acronis has that brand.
We've been doing this for about 16 years.
We're founded in Singapore.
We're headquartered out in Switzerland
and we've got a lot of really smart guys in the backrooms
building good technologies that our partners
are able to use.
And we look at it a lot of different ways.
I've mentioned our go-to market
across a lot of different verticals
and a lot of different kind of routes.
For those, the way we deliver our solution
we provide the flexibility for an enterprise
to a classic re-seller to a VAR or a service provider
that's delivering service today.
It can be delivered to those guys
how they want to consume it.
So, as an example,
we may work with a smaller service provider
that doesn't have any coload capabilities.
We provide data centers
so they can have a very quick turnkey solution
that allows them to get up and running
with their business,
selling backup within minutes to their customers.
We can also work with very large enterprises.
We can deliver the complete platform to them
and then they have complete control over it.
We sprinkle in some professional services
to make sure that we're giving them the support
that they need,
and then they're running the service for themselves.
What we've really seen in terms of a trend
is that a lot of these VAR's,
we have about 4,500 of them in North America.
They're starting to look at their business as different
and say, "I got to adapt or die here.
"I got to figure out what my next business model is.
"How am I going to be the next one that's in the newsflash
"that says hey they've been acquired
"or hey, Thoma Bravo made a big investment in me", right?
They need to convert to the services business.
Acronis enables that transformation to happen.
>> I can see you guys really making money
for channel partners because they want solutions.
They want to touch the customer.
They want to maybe add something
they could bring into it
or have high service gross profits around services.
>> Absolutely, so, our solution is unique in the sense that
allows partners to sell multiple offerings,
so you're getting an additional layer of stickiness
by providing multiple solutions to a customer,
you're using the same technology,
so your IT team is very familiar
with what they're using on a daily basis.
You're reducing the amount of churn for your customers
because you're selling so much additional there
that they're really stuck with you
and that's a good thing.
And beyond that,
you're increasing our average revenue per user
is a key metric that all of our partners we're looking at,
and these guys are owners operators, right?
They're business owners.
They're looking at the bottom line.
>> I mean it's interesting they're operating leverage around
the consistent platform
just gives them software economic model.
They can get more profit over time
as they make that investment.
Look, at the end of the day,
channel partners care about a couple of things.
The money, profit and customer happiness (laughs).
>> Pat: Absolutely and it helps to--
>> They don't want to have a lot of one-offs,
and a lot of training, you know?
>> Anything complicated or anything confusing,
or anything that requires a lot of resources,
they're not going to like.
It's also great to have events like this
where you're able to press the flesh with these guys
and meet them face-to-face
and understand their real world challenges
that they're dealing with on a daily basis.
>> How is the sports solution set
that you've been involved in?
How has that changed the culture of Acronis?
Has that changed 'cause sports is fun?
People love sports.
They have real problems.
It's a real great use case as well.
How has that changed the culture?
>> It's been amazing.
So one, from a branding perspective,
we're a lot more recognized, right?
The most important thing about these partnerships
for us is that they're actually using the technologies.
So we've got the Red Sox here with us today,
we've got Arsenal represented,
we've got Williams,
we've got Roush Racing,
we got a NASCAR car back here.
They use our technology on a daily basis
and for each one of them
we solve different types of use cases
whether it's sending a large amount of video data
from a Nelson studio over to Fenway Park
or if it's a scout out in the field
that needs to send information back and the laptop crashes.
How do they recover?
A lot of these different use cases.
You can correlate them
right back to a small business owner.
You don't have to be a multi-billion dollar
sports organization on the same channel as this.
>> Well, I'm smiling because we've been called
the ESPN of tech because we bring our set,
we do like the game day thing.
We certainly could love to come join you
on all these marquee events that you're havin'.
>> We'd love to have you. (laughs)
So if you follow us on social, we're out there.
I mean, that's a big part of it.
You mentioned what are VAR's looking for,
what are partners looking for?
They want a personal relationship too.
A lot of that goes away with technology nowadays
and being able to really generate that type
of a personal relationship.
These partnerships enable that to happen.
And they're very unique thing is,
I don't know anything about cars.
We started partnering with Formula 1.
All of a sudden, I know everything about Formula 1.
I go to these races.
I tell everybody I don't know anything about cars,
and I end up being the subject matter expert
for 'em over the weekend.
So we'd love to have you guys join us.
We'd love all of our partners
to get more engaged in the sports aspect of it
because for us it really is something that again,
they're using us in real life scenarios.
We're not paying to put a sticker on a car
that's going 300 miles around the track, you know?
>> Yeah, it's not just a promotion,
it's a real partnership.
>> Exactly. >> Pat,
congratulations on your success
and good luck, keep blowing away the numbers.
Congratulations.
>> Thank you very much.
>> It's theCUBE coverage here at the Acronis
Global Cyber Summit 2019.
I'm John Furrier.
More coverage after this short break.
(upbeat music)