Hey channel insiders, welcome back to channel insider partner POV. I'm your host Katie Bavoso. On today's episode, CEO of managed cloud services provider Otava, TJ Houseki, makes his return to the series. This time with exciting news about Otaba's newest partnership with scale computing. This partnership brings edge computing offerings to the Otava portfolio for the first time. TJ explains where he saw the demand for edge computing solutions and why scale computing was the right fit as well as how this partnership has already led to an exclusive opportunity with one of the biggest names in data protection.
TJ, welcome back. Great to see you again. Hey, great to see you again, too. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. Thanks so much for coming back on. Thanks for doing more cool stuff. That gives me a reason to bring you back on. So, you win, I win. We're all happy about that. That's right. Yeah. Good news is new news, right? Ex. Exactly. New news is good news. I like that. So, I got to like break right into it today because you guys have been really working hard over there at Otava, you guys and gals.
So, I want to let you talk to me about the new development that we've had within Otava, which is you have a brand new partner in scale computing. talk to me about the impetus of this partnership and how did this come to be? Yeah. No, it's great. I think the easiest way to say it is just like-minded people attract, right? So, Jeff Ready, you know, co-founder and CEO of Scale Computing is a great guy. We're both indie residents, so we're here local in Naptown.
Um, we spend a lot of time together and names tend to cross in the small circle city that we are. And we've we've been connected to scale computing through our parent company and participating in the investment side for scale and their business. And so I've had early visibility over the years into like where they're going, what they're doing, and then being able to track that against where the market's going. It just started to make more sense. The expansion, as you know, and you've talked a lot about with other partners and AI and large language models and data at the edge and, you know, distributed computing and the market is shifting. you're seeing companies like scale computing really start to thrive and it's a natural tuckin for where Otava is moving from centralization to now edge to cloud is really our focus to help and so I think it's a combination of just really good people that was the first one is you know you don't want to get in my opinion you don't want to get into a partnership unless you're truly aligned in values first uh and then um strategy second and I think both check the boxes and so over the last year Jeff and I have spent a lot of time together uh looking at this saying like how could we work together uniquely that's mutually beneficial and then makes you know a disruptive positive impact to the market.
I do often I'm going to see Jeff next month and I do want to know like when he sleeps because over the last year I don't think he's had a chance to. It's been such a huge experience and huge year for scale computing. So yeah, you let me know because I imagine when you see him I just imagine him being really excited and really really sleepd deprived. So that's right. Yeah. Yeah. We we I mean we thrive on caffeine that's for sure when we're together. channel runs on caffeine.
That's right. That's right. And we run on a different kind of edge. We just got to get 100%. So, are you only partnering with Indiana based and Great Lakes based companies? No, I'm kidding. But I imagine you you talk about the values and and the culture fit. And you know, I don't think we talk enough about that in technology. So, can you kind of ruminate on that a little bit more for me? Is when it comes to culture, what are you looking for from those partners, whether it be vendors or customers?
What does culture mean to you? Yeah, it's a great question. I think, you know, kind of pulling it apart a little bit. Technology gets a bad rap sometimes. So, what happens is it's kind of it's kind of like, well, if if you're if you're socially incapable, right? If you can't hold a conversation, but you're really good with something that has an IP address, you belong in technology, right? That's good. And so, we tend to not think about those things in terms of technology and business strategy.
We tend to think first about technical application use case, you know, where where the actual physical, you know, transactional technology fits, but it really is just business. That's all that it is. And it's figuring out through people and relationships, you know, what aligns well for what you're trying to accomplish. But specifically, you know, culture for me, you know, you have mission, vision, values, right? Like what are you trying to be as a company, whether it's now or when you grow up, however you want to think about that.
Uh, and for that happened for I still haven't grown up. I'm still waiting for Peter Pan. You know, Peter Pan, I'm going to be I'm I'm with you all the way through. I think I'm a Toys R Us kid forever. Even though they're not I'll live Toys R Us. That's right. Exactly. Yeah. But yeah, so for me, you know, it really comes down to, you know, a couple of basic things. One, can you have high integrity? Does the person that you're working with equally see the world through the same lens and view that you do?
Um that it's integrity and character above all else. Uh second, do you follow through on the things that you say that you will do and and how you know and how you conduct yourself? And then third is, you know, are you really focused on making a positive impact in the market or just focused on making money? And neither is really bad. You can go out there and make a difference by just making money. But it's it's quite different when you're looking at trying to solve problems with technology and money's the byproduct of that, right?
And so I think you're looking for good people in my opinion when you're looking at a strategic partnership because it's not always going to go great. You know, you everybody has a great vision for where they want to be, but it's the journey in the middle that's messy that requires that you've aligned really well with your partner so that when you have your low lows and your high highs, you don't get too high or too low. You can stay pretty neutral, balanced, and level-headed through it.
So Jeff checks all those boxes and his team scales a great company. Uh, and it's been really fun to watch over the last decade and a half what they've done. And to your point earlier, it's nice to see them having the success that they've worked really hard for and to hit their clip and for us to be a part of that is really great. Special. Yeah. No, that's very well said. And so I that gives me a little bit more confidence that Jeff has found ways to sleep and rest and and all of that.
So, well, let's talk more about what scale computing is bringing to the Otava portfolio. You already mentioned it, edge computing. We're seeing a greater demand for that. But why don't you talk to me about your experience and Otava's experience and seeing that demand grow. I I'd really like to know of of course I know you knew Jeff. I know you knew that edge computing has always been in the ether of what we do, but where did you see the demand whether it be in 2023 or 2024 start to really lean where you said this needs to be a part of our our business or we're not going to continue forward?
It's it's going to be it's an all or nothing sort of situation. Yeah, it's a great question. really late I would say fourth quarter 2022. Um started to see market shifting and and and where folks were going with data and data applications. You're seeing you know it's not like artificial intelligence is new, right? It's been around for a very long time. But when you make a technology more readily available and usable at the everyday level, you start to see a greater level of adoption, right?
So you look at the adoption curve and where we are relative to where we were just in 2022, now looking at 2025 and everything is different. the the rate of technological evolution, the rate of release, the rate of adoption is way through the roof. Right? So, um in 20 late 22, early 23 started to look at it and say, "Okay, we can see the trend line and where it's going." By 24, we recognized very clearly when we were looking at a combination of factors.
One of them being Broadcom. We can talk a little bit about that, the big change. You and I mentioned that before. And then you start to look at generative AI plus Broadcom and now you've got a couple of really big events that say, "Hey, people are rethinking now about what they're paying for, where they're putting their money, what they want to get out of that because costs equally are going up at the same time that technology is changing, right?
So they're they're kind of looking at the two. But if you look at market value, market value and edge computing in 23 and 24 really finished out at about 11 billion in market value. By 2032, market value is about 113 billion is where edge computing will be. And at that same period of time, data protection is growing from a market value of about 43 billion today to about three or four times that between 130 and $160 billion. So the data is there showing you that people are moving closer to where data is being originated.
They're they're innovating applications differently. And so what was largely sector specific I think before where manufacturing might benefit from it, right? or multilocation retail might benefit from it. You're seeing adoption now at edge computing that is even in more traditional enterprise or centralized computing architectures. So it's pretty cool. That's, you know, for for me what we saw for Otava was public cloud is shifting, right? You know, you're you're seeing again that's just a different form of centralization, arguably at a higher cost, but there's a lot of flexibility there.
And then private cloud, it it keeps going at a steady clip. But we were looking for like what's that next thing that with our expertise in cloud and secure architecture design that we could marry together with a new solution that is really positive and disruptive. and we saw what Scale is doing and just believe, hey, they're leaders in the edge and we think that's that's the right wagon to hitch ourselves to. You said several things there that I have a follow-up question to, but let's start with uh you brought up the B- word uh Broadcom and knowing that VMware is a part of the Broadcom portfolio.
And if you're just tuning in right now for the first time ever, that's not news. We've known about this for a long time, but as we know, VMware and Scale Computing are competitors in the virtualization space and beyond. you're still a Broadcom partner. Does this impact your relationship with Broadcom at all? And talk to me about how that goes from here. How do you partner with both of them? Yeah, it's tricky, right? Like it's it's funny your question is the same as my board of directors.
Oh, good. How do you think about this, you know, strategically? And I think it comes down to understanding who you are, right? We're we Otaba as a company and and many of our peer groups in this space in Channel for example and others, we're not manufacturing the software, right? So when you look at ownership, it Broadcom is an owner. Microsoft is an owner. Scale is an owner. Right? My job is to provide thought, leadership, intelligence, insight and value to the customers to say, "Hey, as you buy these technologies, be it software, hardware, the combination of both.
How do you put them together in the right way? And how do we take our experience with not only other customers, but multiple industries and give you the right kind of advice?" And so, you could argue you could go one of two ways. I've seen people that have doubled down and they've said, "We're Broadcom only. That's just, you know, who we are and how we do it." And I've I've seen other companies take strategies like ours where they diversify uh and they they try to offer alternative hypervisor approaches.
The direct answer to your question is I see it as complimentary right so what we use in broadcom which is for private cloud and centralization and even you know in our multi-tenant model for multicloud that is it's a great hypervisor it's not like broadcom and the technology is a bad uh technology right they're just going through a very different change in their approach you know with it and it's affecting the industry but scale is how we're using it is uh really solving a couple of very specific things that we could not solve in broadcom Um, and that was one, lower costs.
Let's just be honest, costs have gone up dramatically. That has been the big sticking point. That has been the heartburn, if you will, for many customers out there. It's like, hey, we're looking for these technologies at lower cost points because we can't sustain this, right? So, that's one. The other one is customers were looking for something that was simpler like, hey, we we know that we have access to all these advanced technologies and feature sets within Broadcom, for example, but what else can we access if we don't need all of those things?
And so when you combine we may not need all of those things with increased pricing and really the value proposition in that moment right now is well you get all these things for this increased price you're going to have to find different ways to complement the business uh and to help customers and so we see it as complimentary. Um I'm certain that Broadcom and and others would would understand uh they have many many partners out there that are reselling Microsoft Azure and Google at the same time as Broadcom.
But our position hasn't changed. We're top 400 partner with Broadcom and we continue to be quite aggressive in sharing our private cloud product line, continue to grow in that product line. So, we're hoping that this complements that quite well and we can see, you know, where it goes. I do appreciate that you mentioning being a top 400 partner with Broadcom and I don't necessarily think you'll you'll have any comment on this thought that I have, but I think it does set the precedent in the market for these vendors when you see what your partners are doing because of customer demand based on things as simple as price.
It really does matter. especially today. Um, we'll talk about that more going forward too. Considering now going back to the edge computing conversation, just for those who don't know, is scale computing your first edge computing vendor in the portfolio? Uh, just talk to me about where where that stands. It is. Yeah, scale is our first and and only. Um, so so to to our comments, you know, before about Broadcom, I'm no more interested in hedging against scale than I am against hedging against Broadcom.
The way in which you think about advancing product innovation is what complements the portfolio of products that solves for the problems that customers are sharing with you that they're running into. And so, you know, who better to partner with than best-in-class and leader in the space, right? Hypercon converged infrastructure was, you know, a name coined by Jeff, you know, Allen Convoy, Scale Computing, like these are the guys that pioneered it.
So, I don't think you can get any better, you know, when you look at that kind of a partnership. So, yeah, they're they're best in class in our opinion. Um, that's who we're exclusively aligned with. And then we have, and I know we'll get to it, but other strategic connections that really thread the two of us together uniquely. And so, that reinforces the decision of this is who I'm married to as Jeff and I joke. So, I'm sure our wives would comment on that.
But, yeah, I'm waiting. I'm going to get that call once this this episode drops. I'm getting that call, too. And so with with that in mind, does would you say that this widens your customer base or deepens the relationship you have with existing customers and why? Yeah, I I think both. We're fortunate that the a great many of our customers have been with us for multiple three, four renewals and average contract cycles of two or three years, right?
So we have great tenure, you know, established with our customers, but we're also seeing that those customers are bringing new projects to us that are interesting that current technologies can't solve for. And we see that that was part of that lead into hey edge could solve some of this. Give customers a different way to think about this or complement what they're currently buying from us. So that that addresses the deepening of the current customers.
I also think it's incredibly important as a reseller that you're showing thought leadership. You're showing continued innovation so that your customers can see like okay you're growing and going. You're not just you know collecting a check you know for services that were you know rendered you know years past. But the other side of it is it does open up an entirely new addressable market, right? So today we we centrally provide data center services hosted in one of our 13 locations, you know, multinationally.
This allows for us to get anywhere we want, right, to the customer and really make that impact wherever they are as opposed to where we are. And so I'm excited about that. Um I can't tell you yet as I look at the market, you know, what what we think is realistic from a penetration perspective. We're early as we start to evaluate that, but we're excited about what we see and early indications are showing that the demand is there. So, that'll be fun just to see new market, new customers, new conversations, new problems that come with it.
New problems. Yeah. As long as you know. Yeah. You dropped the word solution earlier. Are you ready to talk about the solution that you're referring to when it comes to between Otava and scale computing? What is the brainchild, the love child, if you will, that has come from this partnership? Credit to Jeff, right? He started the journey 14 and a half years ago. And one of the things that he was always in pursuit of was if I'm going to build one of the leading technologies in hyperconverged infrastru infrastructure and if I'm going to build, you know, a leading technology in in edge architecture, then I want to partner with leaders that complement.
And one of those leaders that he's always been interested in working with was a fast grower that everybody now knows, but maybe in the season didn't associate with enterprise class services, and that's veh. you know, they have roughly a $15 billion market cap, but interestingly enough, if you rewind the clock on them even 10 years ago, Veh is a very different company at that point in time, right? And so, they've gone through their own massive growth journey and you're watching scale go through now its growth clip.
And so, what we saw between Jeff and I was, you know, hey, Otava is a very large VH partner. We have a lot of thought leadership established in there, greater than probably a decade now as leaders in architecting advanced data protection solutions. and maybe there's a way in which we as an established VEH partner could help scale get the attention that they've been trying to get with veh executive leadership. And so about a year ago uh 13 or let's see almost 15 months ago now Jeff and I sat down here in Indianapolis grabbed a bite to eat and I said hey listen I I think there's a way that I can help and put us in the middle uh as a strategic distribution partner.
We already have street credibility with veh and so the risk is really unique in the sense that they're taking risk on organizing and prioritizing development to make scale hypervisor a priority. No different than Proxmox or Nanix or OVH or VMware Microsoft but we think that we can garner the that kind of attention. And so the credit goes to one Jeff being willing to say hey yeah I want some help. I want a partner and somebody that you know can work with.
That's that's not easy. Some people can't do that whether it's ego or insecurity. Jeff's not that guy. And so again, one one more reason we we align real well. And then um the other credit goes out to a gentleman named Shiva. And Shiva is the general manager and senior vice president of North America for VEH. And Shiva, he'll watch this, but he he put his neck out on the line and he said, "Hey, this is this might not be popular in veh because in order to prioritize one thing, you have to depprioritize another." And again, Scale had been trying for quite a while.
So between Shiva and his help, between me and then my team, Brian Hoklman, uh and many others, Austin Cook, Chris Barilski, uh and then Jeff and his team, uh Craig and many others, we were able over the course of a year to put together a three-party agreement. And so Otava is now exclusively uh the strategic distribution partner for VH license resell from veh into scale. And we are excited about that relationship over the next 10 years. Oh my goodness.
Congratulations. How exciting. Yeah, really excited. Apparently, I I heard you've already gotten some accolades from the VEH side surrounding this. Can you share about those? Yeah, we're excited. We just we just recently found out that we were awarded as uh VH's North America partner of the year. We're grateful. We went through a massive transformation through this journey and this partnership of scale and then became most recently a platinum partner which for those that don't know that's top 16 partners in North America for VH services and then uh amongst the whole ecosystem of partners were awarded uh top partner of the year in North America.
So we're really proud of that. It's a testament uh to testimony excuse me uh to the team and their hard work. And so I'm I'm excited for them and for Otava. Oh wow. Congratulations to the entire Otava team. everybody watching this a round of applause for Otava. Awesome stuff. And I know that that's something you'll also be talking about as we go into scale computing platform season in miday. So what is your goal for? Is this your first time going?
No, this will be uh this will be year two for me. I was there last year with Jeff. Yep. Very nice. Very nice. But how is it going to differ from last year for you now that this is all coming out that you're going to be you're going to be more of a central part of it this year? Yeah, it'll be it'll be quite different. So I'm careful than never and Jeff knows this about me not overstate our our value right this is about scale this is about platform this is about them but as a strategic partner we are excited to have a bigger role both as a sponsor uh for the event itself and then um contribute in both the keynote announcement with Jeff for this partnership with veh and now scale being an approved hypervisor uh and then equally have a handful of speaking slots uh that we're going to be talking to market trends and data like where where we're going and why this is so relevant.
We're going to speak to our secure framework and some of the things that we do uniquely to enable the technologies that we're talking about. And I know Jeff has mentioned that you his goal of platform over the years is to really migrate it to more of a a technology education like a great industry event that folks come not just learn about scale but learn more about market trends and what's going out there. So companies like Mako Networks and Simply Nook and others are able to bring and add value.
So it's uh it's great. I love it and as you and I have said, if you have men to platform, it's a great event. I highly encourage it. It's it's hosted by great people. Uh they do a great job. Uh it's in a great setting. So, it's a it's a lot of fun and um definitely no lack of sunshine. So, that's always nice. It makes you get out there. You It's funny because you talk about, you know, oh, if you're an introverted person, you do really well in technology.
Well, it's still even if you're not introverted, you are spending a lot of time in front of the computer inside. And so I feel like Las Vegas forces you to get a little bit more vitamin D out there. Yeah, you get a lot of vitamin D and a whole lot of people watching. So it's it's you get both. It is it is it is interesting space in the world. My voice had barely recovered from channel partners the last time you and I spoke last year which was also in Vegas.
And so I'm already mentally and honestly physically preparing for for another Vegas trip. I need I needed a break. Last year I was in and out of Vegas for a quarter on and off. It's like we're going to we're going to take a little bit of a break here. We need some girls. Yeah. No loud noises. I'm very excited to go back now, but I've appreciated the rest. Awesome. Awesome. Yeah, you're ready. You're ready. I get so excited in the edge computing conversation because I think that it is so it's cool and and quite often we don't always talk about the cooler parts of technology in the channel.
It's more so the things that are making just your day-to-day run and your business run. And that's not always that exciting. But even for just what we're discussing with edge computing, can you talk to me about and I know you're still trying to figure out like where these solutions will be applied to, but where do you see your customers using edge computing right now even in just the verticals that you're seeing this become an addressable market for you?
Yeah, sure. It's a great question. I think obviously retail multilocation retail point of sales systems and trying to keep data close to the edges is a home run, right? That that's and you've seen scale do a fantastic job there. We've seen other companies do that using scale reselling it in oil and gas, you know, and targeting those areas. Where we see some pretty interesting things are your regional credit union providers. So, when you look at regional financial institutions, you know, they're in need of similar technologies for same regulatory requirements, but maybe not the exact same as a full-blown VMware Broadcom, right?
So, they're looking for fault tolerance. They're looking for high availability. they're looking for a hypervisor can do that, but they're also looking for a simpler cost of ownership and an easier technical management footprint. So, that's one area for us. We've already had early conversations for that. Additionally, an interesting one, I had a meeting with uh an NFL team uh and so sat down and talked to them about edge computing and about scale specifically in their use case and that is so that they can use that as they travel uh for sports so that they can host their video on demand on on the road uh whether it's at training camps or whether it's at field game or travel games on their schedule and the like and is a smaller technology footprint for them to lift and take it with them.
Right? So those are some current uh use cases that are pretty interesting. And then within our healthc care sector, you know, we have uh multilocation, you know, rollups that are tied towards uh heavy there's a lot of consolidation going on in areas like dentist groups, optometrists where again same demanding regulatory requirements with HIPPA and high trust, but similar in technical need, not same as a full healthare system, right? And those tend to be multilocation in nature.
Traditionally don't have IT people out at each of those locations. they kind of have a centralized staff and they're looking for how can we enable that staff to do more work with less people. And so I'm really excited about those because we have many of those customers already and they've expressed that need of hey we want to keep working with you but we're looking for how can we get more for the dollar that we're spending and and do more with that application.
So I think those are some near-term opportunities for us that we're very interested in and we're going to be focused on marketing to. You've brought up cost a couple of times and I do have a question that I was waiting to get to and I think now is the most important time to do that. As we're recording this, we've just been through um an an up and down situation in the federal government uh concerning tariffs. And not to get too deep into that, but just generally, I know it's been difficult for people to kind of plan their budgets out for 2025 and into 2026 because of conversations like that.
Budgeting is always probably the worst part of figuring out what are we going to do over the next year for any business. How are you helping lead your customers through times of uncertainty like that? Especially when we're talking about edge computing and and cloud in general. You have people that they they get really itchy to kind of want to drop something or figure something out by like finding a cheaper solution. How are you helping guide them in a way that is like you can do this without blowing up your entire tech stack and trying to just not pay anything?
How are you helping them guide that? It's well said. Great question. The key is not blowing up their current. No, it's it's a great question. I mean, head head on, right? The tariffs are concerning. Um, but I don't mean to minimize this. It's it's no less concerning than you know what happens with inflation postcoid or what happens with you know the financial crisis in the early 2000s right this is part of life uh and I think that the the most important thing that I try to bring from a leadership perspective to my customers and then to my employee base and even in education when I talk across peer groups the board and the like is that if you're trying to solve your technology problems from a business perspective and it's entirely about cost you usually fall short.
Nine out of 10 times you're going to fall short because you're looking at it very one-dimensionally, which is how cheap can I get this or what budget number can I get to instead of what business outcomes are you trying to solve and what how does that connect to your multi-year strategy? And what I find is a lot of folks in the IT space, you know, think about the organizational structure and design of companies. A lot of times you have IT folks that report up through like a finance vertical or they report up through an operational vertical.
Not everybody gets the benefit of a CIO or a CTO or somebody that is a strategic technical thinker. And if you look at the market that is consuming many services from the Otavas of the world, they tend to align with that. They're small business to mid-enterprise where they're compressed in their organizational structure. And so my responsibility is to help them understand like our tariffs, you know, an obstacle. Yes, for sure you're going to see rising costs on the hardware side. uh particularly on imports uh companies like Cisco, Fordinet, PaloAlto, others have expressed yeah there may there may be rising costs there many of them have also expressed they don't know that they'll see rising costs on the software side the continued expense side so when you think about cost against capital versus cost against IBIDA and largely profitability it's still a TBD right but what I'm trying to do and I would encourage others to do at my level and and and across the board is really talk about costs more holistically not just the cost from that you're getting from your vendor, but what is the cost of doing business in general?
When you look at your headcount, when you look at, you know, your labor, you look at your software, you look at your your real estate, you look at all these different things that you're doing, circuits, services, internet, are you really looking at this holistically? Because I I tend to find that even today, even with Broadcom, we had many customers that, you know, their first partner that they talked to said, "Yeah, your costs are going to go up." They ended up saving money coming and working with Otava.
But it's a very different conversation. It requires them to have a good business head on their shoulders. It requires them to move intentionally but not necessarily fast. Speed isn't always success. And so, uh, that's that's really the approach I try to take is cost does matter, but I think it's more about the value that you get for that cost and having a more holistic approach. Very well put. And I think that generally saying that is saying we cannot go into this looking at just the numbers.
You have to decide what's going to be best for your company because that ultimately is going to determine how much you can spend when all this is said and done because you have to decide how much money you can make. Going on from there, TJ, you also talked about the secure framework. That was something we spoke about last year when we when we first got to meet in on this podcast. I would really love to know how you're continuing to iterate on top of the secure framework and how is uh your new vendor uh your new vendor partner scale computing fitting into that.
Yeah, it's great. Thank you. Uh it's it's fun. It's been actually really fun and rewarding to watch what started as a skunk works project to you know internal to turn into something that's really revolutionized our business and more importantly the way in which we talk to customers and help them think about consuming technology right so as a quick recap you know secure framework is our way of having a layered defense conversation and helping customers understand the OSI stack and thinking through layer 1 to you know layer 7 what does that look like and what are the technologies at each of those levels that I should be thinking about when I'm buying controls and protection because what we tend to find and we all know this right there is a technology vendor for everything whether it's intrusion prevention intrusion detection you know anti-malware anti-ransomware immutable storage and you know it's not just that your costs get crazy it's really more about your administrative burden like all these things that you have and so secure framework is designed in such a way that allows you to methodically take a customer through that conversation and say hey what are you buying to solve for this section in defense and both offense defense, defense, you know, in your in your technology stack.
Um, now that's evolved. So, it started as a framework for a consultative conversation allowed for us to organize, you know, quotes and presentations around that so that customers as they go to buy their solution have identified, okay, this is what I expressed my need was. You validated that, you know, through this process and proposal has now turned into us innovating and creating a secure score. And so when you log into our portal uh for customers consuming our technologies, we use the NIST framework to cross mapap this to best practices.
And so what happens is a customer can now whether it's a technology from us or a technology from other, they can see where they score and rank relative to what their security posture should be versus what it is. And this forces customers to do the hard stuff, which is it's great that you're backing up, but are you quarterly restoring those backups? It's great that you have DR. are you running simulated DR or table, you know, tabletop exercises? And so we've been able to connect it to a visual score that speaks more to your CFO, your CEO to say, hey, here's your return on investment measured as in secure score against what we proposed to you, which would be buying criteria, why you should buy these things and make these investments.
So, it's coming together really nicely. We've received a lot of really great feedback on it. We love uh that we're able to add visualization uh to what feels often like nebulous theory with technology. So something tangible is always good for the finance side of business. Yeah. Yeah. Gamification, visualization, anything that makes people want to want to check it. When you say score, they're like a score. You say you're you're grading me on this.
Yeah. Yeah. At the end of the day, we all want to be entertained, right? So yeah, entertained and winners. We want to win the tabletop games for sure. As you have that conversation more and more with your customers, is it becoming easier on the security side? Are you seeing people take it more seriously in 2025? Yeah, it is right. And I think the reality is most customers have now accepted the if versus when. It's not if I'm going to get ransomware, it's when.
And am I properly prepared to protect myself through that process? Have I put together all the right policies, the procedures, the insurance protection and coverage, you know, that, you know, the technology itself to help create defense or offense in that moment, uh, incident response, right? All those pieces that that flow together. So the conversation is it's it's easier in the sense that customers are not numb to it. They're pretty receptive. Um like they understand it's real.
And before and I don't mean to minimize it, but I think even just a short 10 years ago, many people looked at ransomware and they're like, "Well, that's that's not going to happen to me, right?" Like that's that happens, but it didn't happen to me. They're going after the bigger companies. And now 10 years later, especially with artificial intelligence and the tools that make it easier for people to do this on a proactive basis even with less skill, they can still be as as effective if not more so.
Businesses are looking at this going this is an issue like and and we we really welcome this kind of a conversation. So um yeah, we find it it's been it's been great. It's been receptive. Um, again, I think probably the greatest outcome from it is it's a consistent conversation. And so, regardless of industry, if you can have the Chick-fil-A approach, if you will, uh, that, uh, you get the same experience, the same conversation, whether you're healthcare, whether you're finance, whether you're private sector, education, um, I think that's really what this is about is, you know, keeping this simple and repeatable.
And so, that's, I think, the biggest thing rewarding wise that's come out of this for us and for customers. Oh, for sure. I think to your point about that that conversation of it's it's the same across industries, it's the same across verticals. Even if you're talking to a level of of business that may not have a complete comprehension of what data is or what their private data means if it gets out, everybody understands of do you like your money?
Do you want to keep that money? Yeah, that's right. Do this. So, it's a very good point there in talking about that conversation. Going on from there and just looking forward to the rest of the year, we're in Q2 now. What's next for Otava as we get deeper into 2025 and of course, how can customers take advantage of all the new cool stuff you have going on with scale computing and veh? Yeah, thank you. No, I'm I'm incredibly excited for the rest of the year.
So at a high level, major milestones are the platform event coming out of platform and allowing for customers to visit otava.com uh and to start doing uh opportunity registration not only for edge computing direct from Otava visav scale but also being able to pre-register maybe they're already a scale customer or they're already a VH customer one or the other and they're saying hey now you're going to have the ability to put both of these solutions together. they'll be able to pre-register uh through our website at otaba.com to start doing that.
Talk to our solution architects or our sales executives to start thinking about that. So that's a big milestone for us here uh in May June. Excited about that. And then we look forward to the fall where veh is finishing uh first version for the development and approval uh for the integration uh and then you go from you know demand registration over the summer into implementation and start helping customers you know adopt this new uh new option for them.
So uh it'll be a very busy year. It already has been. I feel like feel like it should be December already. So it's been intense as you know right? So, uh, yeah, Jeeoff and I joke, we're like, "Okay, this is going to be an interesting year." Uh, so we've we've got quite a bit of early demand already starting. Um, but that's our focus is to to really shore up postplatform, helping folks get connected to um what we're getting them excited about, how to consume that, and then um connect the dots and implement uh all of that as we get into the fall.
And considering that VH integration, for the customers that are listening and they want to explore that, how can they know if they're a good fit for it or is it widespread? Is it something anybody can take advantage of? What what should they look for? Yeah, it's really anybody, right? I mean, you think about it today, one of scale's uh partners for, you know, backup protection or data protection is a cronis, right? And so when you look at again earlier to the market size and the customer consumption uh of BH, it's large, right?
It's quite significant. And so there's many more VH customers than there are scale customers. But there's going to be many customers out there that are currently vehicle and maybe a year ago uh or 18 months said we love it but it's just not an option for us because we have pabytes of data and in order for us to be able to switch the hypervisor side based on what we need we cannot give up our data protection strategy and now they don't have to right and so I think this opens up the door really for multiple conversations in you know one camp is the customers that might be looking for uh an edge play or an alternative Hypervisor.
Now they can have that conversation with scale computing through Otava or obviously the the broader scale ecosystem of partners that enables those partners as well to be able to talk about veh with their customers which is really exciting. And then I think there's those customers as well that might be consuming a competitive product like Acronis or um uh another backup provider. It could be Cobalt and they're they're looking at hey we want the edge play and you know for us that edge play is going to come with veh and so it's a double win. they get the benefit of the leader in edge computing and they get the leader in data protection.
So, it's going to be interesting. I think the demand is understated relative to what the market is doing. I know Jeff feels the same way. And then um we've we've got good data points that show us particularly from a perspective of scale looking out at the market, you know, how many customers have been saying like we'd love to come over, but veh is a really critical path, you know, to our our success. So, I don't think there's better timing and a better uh uh marriage between the three groups.
So, it's going to be it's going to be interesting for sure. So, now you're going to be the one not sleeping very much and I'm going to have to check up on you now, too. That's you and I see each other next time. We'll be having like a pitch of coffee while we're sitting here. So, don't worry. I'll bring plenty of concealer and powder to platform just in case you need it. Looking forward to it. Yeah. Well, TJ, thank you so much for your time today.
And for those who are listening and want to reach out and learn more about Otava, where can they go? So check us out at otava.com. Um I know that sounds simple, right? Go to the website. Meant to be simple, right? But it's meant to be simple. Check us out at otava.com. You can engage directly there with all sides of the business, including me. But really excited. Um I I want to give a shout out to the marketing department. Uh on May 1st, we are launching a new version of our website and they have put a lot of time and effort into this asset and really excited about what it's going to do uh to help customers, you know, understand the information that we're putting out there, but how it connects to their needs.
So, the timing couldn't be better to say go to otava.com. You're going to get to see a lot of really great things there, whether it's media content, copy content, you know, and more. Schedule some time to speak with anybody. Uh, that would be great. And then if you're at Platform, you know, come and and and talk to to me or anybody else there and say, "Hey, saw this and would love to hang out and learn a little bit more." So, platform will be a lot of fun.
DJ, thank you so much. This has been such a fun time to get to talk to you and and learn more about I continue to learn more about Otava as we go through the rest of the year. I also know just I'm looking at the sign behind you. I think it was you that brought back another season of Ted Lasso in the near future. So, I have you to thank for that. I tried to will it through. I tried to will it through. I've been I've been Ted Lasso since the pilot when I when COVID hit and I'm like I got nothing to do.
And then I turn on this British comedy and went, "Oh my god, my life will never be the same. This is amazing, right? Uh, and some days I feel more like Ted and and then there's there's there's other days that I feel more like Roy, but nonetheless, it's still just as fun. So, I'm either a Keely or a Roy myself. You never know. Depends on the day. I love it. Well, I'm excited to spend time with you and see you platform and uh it's going to be a lot of fun.
I agree. Thanks so much to TJ for joining me once again and thank you for watching or listening. You can check out every episode of Channel Insider Partner POV on channelinsider.com or watch us on YouTube at youtube.com/ channelinssider_news and trends. You can also listen to us as a podcast wherever you get your podcast from. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and follow wherever possible so you never miss an episode. Come connect with Channel Insider on X or LinkedIn or with me, Katie Baboso. Once again, I'm your host, Katie Bavoso, and I'll see you next time.
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