Ben Kepes saw Rubrik present at Cloud Field Day 2 back in July of 2017. Here he talks about Rubrik’s newest product, Radar, designed to protect customers against ransomware. Ben has been continuously impressed with Rubrik’s development and expects them to IPO and become a major player in the industry in the near future.
Here’s your next storage IPO. Rubrik gets its revenue and leadership ducks in a row
In this post, Ben Kepes looks at recent moves by Rubrik as indicative of an upcoming IPO. This includes adding Microsoft’s John Thompson to their board, naming former Atlassian CFO Murray Demo to the same position, and strong sales numbers. We’ll be keeping an eye on the company to see if 2018 is the year of their IPO.
Better together: Rubrik acquires Datos IO
Ben Kepes breaks down the news the Rubrik is acquiring Datos IO. This helps Rubrik add backup and recovery for NoSQL databases to their already impressive data management portfolio.
CloudStack, the platform with nine lives, gets another one courtesy of Accelerite
Ben Kepes takes a look at the history of CloudStack, which was acquired by Accelerite and renamed to Rovius Cloud. Even though OpenStack appeared to be an ersatz competitor to CloudStack, but lagged in adoption due to investors and vendor adoption. Ben was impressed that Rovius remains server, storage, an hypervisor agnostic, allowing organizations to federate on-premises resources with public clouds including AWS, Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft Azure.
NetApp and Rubrik, a David and Goliath situation? Part Three
In the final installment of his Cloud Field Day comparison between Rubrik and NetApp, Ben Kepes comes to the conclusion that both companies are in a good, but different, position to guarantee their future. Rubrik has none of the constraints around existing revenue streams, sales force motion or customer expectations that NetApp has, making it a much more agile player, while NetApp has deep relationships with the world’s largest enterprises giving it a leg up in the industry. Despite this, Ben ultimately decides that “if NetApp realizes both the opportunity and the threat, this battle is theirs to lose – they have the pedigree, the existing market share, the cash reserves and the brand recognition to pull one out of the bag and guarantee their future.”
ServiceNow and the challenge of going broad
After Cloud Field Day, Ben Kepes reviews ServiceNow, a company that has come along way from its San Diego Roots. Traditionally, ServiceNow has been seen as an IT helpdesk system vendor, but now, ServiceNow has begun pursuing its aims to become a vendor that offers tools to enable organizations to digitize their more general enterprise workflows. Ben believes that ServiceNow is in a position where they are large enough to invest resources in this project, but small enough to remain agile, a combination that sets them up for a bright future.
NetApp and Rubrik, a David and Goliath situation? Part Two
As part of his series comparing and contrasting NetApp and Rubrik, Ben Kepes talks about Rubrik’s meteoric rise to fame from backup vendor startup to data management powerhouse. Ben believes that Rubrik “has amassed cash, a stellar crew and, perhaps most importantly, a unique point in time when change is ramping up.” This has led Rubrik to a position where they can build something of real substance, and Ben looks forward to what they have in store.
NetApp and Rubrik, a David and Goliath situation? Part One
Ben Kepes writes about the differences he saw between NetApp and Rubrik at Cloud Field Day. Ben notes that NetApp has long had financial pressure not to innovate, even if that innovation helps NetApp ensure its long term survival. Now, however, with their acquisition of SolidFire and their appointment of Mark Bregman as CTO, Ben sees NetApp as moving towards a focus on innovation. This is a move in the right direction, but NetApp still might be falling behind its innovative competitors.
The commercial benefits of saying it clearly…
After Cloud Field Day, Ben Kepes argues that companies need to clearly articulate what they do. He says that too often, useful and innovative products are overlooked because their creators cannot clearly explain their purpose. This means that the wrong products are getting commercial success. He concludes by saying, “if you can’t articulate what you do in a way that a 50-year old steelworker from the Midwest can understand, best you rethink what you’re doing.”
Heading to Cloud Field Days (2) next week
Ben Kepes is looking forward to a different kind of conference, Cloud Field Day! Here, he explains the event, goes over each presenter, and gives his opinion on what they have been up to in the cloud field.
Ben Kepes
Ben Kepes is a business leader, a technology evangelist, an entrepreneur, and a commentator.
Speaking in Tech: ‘Radical dev-docused’ work from Apple…
Speaking in Tech: ‘Radical dev-docused’ work from Apple…
