Over the last six weeks, I’ve been fortunate enough to be invited to the HPE Worldwide Ambassadors Summit (WWAS) and the HPE Technical Solution Summit (TSS), with both events designed to technically enable HPE’s internal and partner communities.
Whilst most the information discussed at these events isn’t publicly shareable, there were some key takeaways from both events which I have covered in this blog:
Integration is the way forward
I am going to make a big statement here: I am glad it’s not the 90’s anymore, especially for IT. Back then, the world was CLI driven and even today there are still a large volume of people using CLI’s daily. However, since the advent of the 10’s, GUI’s have been the way that people are interacting with systems.
If I asked you how you managed your virtual environment, I can almost guarantee that your response would be vCentre web interface or System Centre Virtual Machine Manager. GUI’s have become the norm for most people within the IT sphere.
As we rapidly approach the 20’s, (yeah, we are nearly there!) the world is pivoting from GUI’s for everything to integration into everything. No longer do you have to use a different screen for every different step, but instead to drive platforms from a single screen using APIs to do calls between the different systems, platforms and software.
Partnership is key
The second major takeaway was partnership. This isn’t only vendors working with other vendors but it’s more that vendors are working with channel partners and solutions integrators such as Ultima to provide a between customer experience. I was fortunate enough to present twice at TSS around Ultima and HPE’s partnership on two different deals however, it wasn’t just two organisations working together but an ecosystem of partners that came together to provide a solution to a business goal.
This idea of solving business problems is far bigger than any one vendor, if one company comes in and says it can solve all your goals, be very wary. As yet, I haven’t seen a single vendor that can address even half of the business goals within a customer’s environment.
AI is going mainstream
Last of all is AI, that classic buzzword. Last year, I wrote a piece about the previous TSS that included AI, which you can read here, the big change this year is the rate of adoption. Last year, a lot of people were dipping their toe into it and building cool cat identifying proof of concepts. This year however it was taking this and mapping it to business outcomes.
By leveraging HPE’s ecosystem of partners, HPE have managed to take these cool lab projects and turn them into something that actually drives business values, either by reducing costs; increasing profits; or opening up new, previously untapped, markets.
Overall, these two events have really driven home for the way the market is moving. It is moving away from siloed businesses into a modern, collaborative world where one company can’t go it alone.
Written by Matthew Beale, (Solutions Specialist ‑ Storage)
