Interview – Jon Milford, Director Partner Business, VeloCloud APJ, Riverbed Technology
Jon Milford is Leading a Center of Excellence of specialised Sales Engineers & developing new strategy / programs / processes to accelerate ramp to market for Next-Gen Networking (SD-WAN, SD-LAN, SD-EDGE), Digital Experience Management (End User, Network, App) and WANOP-SaaS Acceleration.
Previously focused on Cisco Business Development for Multiple Architectures & Verticals (Enterprise Networking, Collaboration, Data Center, Security, Commercial, Meraki) in various Regions (APJ, EMEAR and Global)
While at HP for 5 years his roles included Product Management and Channel Development for Enterprise Servers and Storage, focused on portfolio growth and competitive acquisition.
Q. Who are Riverbed Technology and where do they position themselves in the Malaysian market?
A. Riverbed helps organizations maximize digital performance so that they can deliver more compelling user experiences and drive positive business outcomes. We do this through the Riverbed Digital Performance Platform – a powerful combination of Digital Experience Management (DEM) and Next-Generation Infrastructure solutions.
Our DEM offering helps an organization see what’s happening across networks, apps, infrastructure and end user devices and delivers business-relevant insight that empower organizations to proactively measure, assess, and improve digital experiences. The result: higher levels of user satisfaction and faster innovation. Our Next-Generation Infrastructure offering includes capabilities like SD-WAN and application and cloud acceleration, which enable organizations to move faster and more securely by making distributed IT more efficient and providing greater agility and performance to deliver better customer, partner and employee experiences.
Q. What differentiates Riverbed Technology’s range of services to other suppliers within their field?
A. We’re the only vendor in the market that brings these capabilities together (DEM + Next-Gen Infrastructure) to help organizations measure, manage and enhance digital experiences.
Q. What does Riverbed Technology see as some of the key challenges facing senior IT executives within their space?
A. Nearly 2 billion humans in Asia-Pacific are digitally connected. Billions of dollars are being spent on digital transformation. The stakes for IT leaders have never been higher. Performance is critical and user expectations are higher than ever. If digital services crash, are slow or don’t satisfy user expectations then customers leave, orders aren’t fulfilled, employee productivity is impacted, projects are delayed (or fail altogether), and the business suffers. However, what we’re hearing time and time again in our conversations with senior IT leaders in Malaysia, is that they’re struggling to progress on their digital journey for three key reasons: One, limited budget. Two, limited visibility into the user experience – they have no way to measure success of digital initiatives, or to see how actual humans are experiencing new apps and services. And three, legacy network infrastructure is holding them back. It makes sense – they were built long before the cloud was formed. For digital technology to reach its full potential, we need to be able to measure, manage and enhance what matters most – the experience of humans: employees, customers, citizens, etc. This is exactly what we do at Riverbed.
Q. Can you share some examples of how you’re helping actual customers improve digital performance?
A. Absolutely. What’s important to remember is that behind every digital experience is a human one – a citizen, an employee, a client, a patient, a customer. What’s exciting to me is that the work we’re doing is about more than just making apps go faster, making connectivity reliable and secure or understanding where the problems are we need to fix. It’s about helping companies boost digital performance so that they can advance the human experience. For example: Maersk is using Riverbed’s DEM solutions as a key part of their digital journey, measuring customer experience on apps used to pay for and track shipping containers, enhancing the global supply chain experience. Five years ago, 20% of Maersk’s revenue was digital, and today it is over 90%. POS Malaysia is using Riverbed’s DEM solutions as part of a nation-wide digital transformation project which, at its core, is about transforming the experience for increasingly digitally-savvy customers. As they continue down the path of rapid innovation, our technology allows them to measure the impact of IT change on the infrastructure and the end user to mitigate risk and ensure amazing performance. Philippines based microfinance organization, Negros Women for Technology Foundation, Inc. (NWTF), uses Riverbed SD-WAN and app acceleration to bring microfinancing and developmental services to marginalized urban and rural women of the Central Philippines. IT transformation has enabled NWTF to open branches in remote areas with limited connectivity and provide digital services on par with commercialized banks. With every branch opened, NWTF is able to help more women move out of poverty and achieve self-sufficiency for themselves and their families.
Q. What does the future look like for an organisation looking to work with Riverbed Technology?
A. We worked with many of our customers since our early days of pioneering WAN optimisation. That was more than 15 years ago. So many of those customers – 30,000 globally in fact – are with us today because of the innovation we’re leading. We believe we’re delivering the right technology at the right time. We’re skating to where the puck is going with a laser focus on what will matter most for decades to come: advancing the human experience.