TIBCO talked with ChannelBuzz at AWS Re:Invent about how the company has pivoted to an increasingly hybrid and cloud-native world, and how partners like AWS are now a core part of that strategy.
Dan Streetman, TIBCO’s CEO
At the recent AWS Re:invent event in Las Vegas, a large part of the vendors participating in the show were born-in-the cloud startups. TIBCO is neither of those things. They were, however, a Diamond Sponsor, and committed to a cloud-centric view of innovation that is increasingly essential in a world where enterprise strategy has moved to revolve around the hybrid cloud. AWS is one of TIBCO’s key partners, as TIBCO expands the importance of their partner ecosystem further as a key component of their hybrid cloud strategy.
TIBCO – the name is an acronym of The Information Bus Company – is a legacy player that dates from before the dotcom bust in 2000. Their original function was providing the integration software that let infrastructure communicate in real time, and then transporting data where it was needed through Web browsers, regardless of platform or architecture. That functionality has been extended over the years more deeply into business intelligence and analytics, particularly through acquisitions. Their focus today is on meeting the needs of the hybrid cloud world through their Connected Intelligence Cloud,
“There are three key things that every enterprise needs to do,” said Dan Streetman, TIBCO’s CEO, who joined the company in April, coming from BMC, where he had been the EVP of Worldwide Sales and Marketing. “One is to connect APIs, people and devices. That’s what we have done for a long time, but it has become more complex in the hybrid world.
“We also need to unify the view of that data, with master data management, although it’s more complex than that,” Streetman stated. “We are the only provider who can support all data. We can virtualize it, so you can trust data, govern it and secure it. We also need to predict the next actions with data science modelling, serve it up visually with Spotfire [their data analytics solution] and embed AI in that experience. The other aspect is to be able to handle streaming real time data, using historical data and data science models.”
Streetman emphasized that notwithstanding TIBCO’s legacy roots, it is well positioned to address these tasks today.
“Almost all data today comes from something we could call the cloud, including edge devices,” he said. “Ultimately 100% of business will be related to the cloud, although many things will stay on-prem. We are the integration that enables on-prem and cloud integrations. Everything that we build now has to be cloud native and embrace open.”
An essential development, Streetman said, was TIBCO’s 2014 acquisition by Vista Equity Partners.
“Our going private was critical,” Streetman stated. “The Vista sponsorship has been great for us. It strengthened our opportunity to increase our R&D. It also allowed us to build a partner ecosystem that is ready for the modern era.”
That partner ecosystem is critical to TIBCO going forward. It’s also something that Streetman knows well. Before joining BMC in 2016, he was SVP of Worldwide Alliances & Channels at Salesforce between 2012 and 2016, when Salesforce greatly broadened out both its strategic alliances and its reseller channel, moving beyond the largely referral-based model that had characterized its earlier channel years.
“My job is how to improve our relationship with customers – and that means channel,” Streetman emphasized.
Jason Johns, TIBCO’s VP of Global Partners & Alliances
“As we strengthen the partner ecosystem, everything we do is really cloud driven,” said Jason Johns, TIBCO’s VP of Global Partners & Alliances. “We work with all three major cloud providers, and leverage their partner ecosystems. That’s a massive transformation that we have made.
“We have many types of partners, including global system integrators like Accenture and Infosys, who we have worked with for 18 years,” Johns added. “We build our specific cloud plays with them. We have our SIs and solution providers and DMRs and ISVs and MSPs, and we just rolled out a new TIBCO Partner Program.”
“We dramatically enhanced the program to focus on working more effectively with partners,” Streetman said. “It’s also about what’s happening in the market. Partners are adaptive to change, and we see the market changing.”
“The biggest pillar was enhancing deal registration, although with lots of different partner types, we wanted to have a value-add program for them, including inluencers, resellers and those who provide professional services on the back end,” Johns said.
AWS plays a key role in the partner ecosystem.
“We have a long-standing relationship with AWS, working with the APN [AWS Partner Network] group,” Johns said. “We have over 15 products on their Marketplace. We are in their ISV Accelerator program, working closely with them, and working closely with their field organizations as well.”
“We’ve been an AWS Diamond sponsor for a while,” Streetman said. “We really believe in this event. They have the most market share. There are some customers who won’t work with them, who compete with Amazon in retail, and we support them as well. But we are investing heavily in AWS, and on the R&D side. In May, we broke a Web services performance record with them.”
Streetman concluded by emphasizing the joint focus of TIBCO and AWS toward driving innovative customer solutions.
“We both have a commitment to continuing to invest and giving customers the best possible solutions,” he stated. “They are focused on making customer successful. That’s very synergistic.”
