Claude Schuck, the Regional Manager for Middle East at Veeam Software, speaks about his company’s participation at GITEX 2020
Which products and solutions will you be showcasing at GITEX Technology Week?
Veeam is the leader in backup solutions that deliver cloud data management. At GITEX 2020, we will be showcasing our flagship solution – Veeam Availability Suite, a single platform for modernizing backup, accelerating hybrid cloud and securing enterprise data. Regardless of where data resides – physical systems, SaaS services, public cloud, private cloud, hybrid cloud, or multi-cloud – our platform helps companies keep their businesses running.
We are keen to demonstrate Veeam Backup & Replication, as well – the one solution for simple, reliable and flexible protection of ALL enterprise cloud, virtual and physical workloads. Veeam Availability (VAS) v10 which saw general release back in February has more than 150 new features and enhancements, including modern NAS support, Multi-VM Instant Recovery and heightened ransomware protection. VAS v10 includes data protection capabilities that increase availability, portability, and extensibility for Cloud Data Management.
We will also be demonstrating our fastest growing product – Veeam Backup for Microsoft Office 365 which is the No.1 Backup and Recovery solution for Microsoft Office 365. Veeam’s solution eliminates the risk of losing access and control over your Office 365 data including Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business and Microsoft Teams – so that data is always protected and accessible.
During the event, we are eager to start discussions with service providers about Veeam Cloud Connect – a powerful, easily deployable technology that enables them to offer cloud backup or Disaster-Recovery-as-a-Service (DRaaS) to their customers.
What are your expectations from the event this year?
As the leading technology event of the year in the region, we see GITEX as a great platform for vendors, partners and customers to get together and share ideas. This year, as in the past years, we will leverage GITEX to expose our brand, reinforce our commitment to the local market, showcase our product capabilities and innovations and meet with both, existing and prospective customers and partners.
I can attribute much of our success to the relationships we have initiated and fostered at the event and I expect this year to be no different. Every year we have meaningful and memorable interactions based on which we build relationships as well as a pipeline of business for the forthcoming year.
Do you hope for a business relief from the pandemic based on your engagements at the event?
This year has been quite exceptional due to the pandemic but the health and safety of the Veeam community, consisting of employees, partners and customers, has always been a top priority. That´s why we imposed a work-from-home policy early on and switched our entire business to the virtual sphere.
Meetings, customer appointments were seamlessly handled remotely, and we even realized technical demonstrations and proofs of concept. Against this backdrop, Veeam business has remained stable and continued its consistent growth and recently announced its Q3 results and another quarter of double-digit growth with an annual recurring revenue (ARR) increase of 21 percent year-over-year (YoY) for Q3’20.
This is largely due to two reasons. The first is that due to the remote working trend, technology solutions that support working from home scenarios by providing modern data management and data protection capabilities are seeing accelerated interest. Secondly, we are fortunate to have a talented, dynamic and collaborative team.
We have an in-depth understanding of our customers’ specific needs and requirements for them to drive success and business continuity, which is why organizations continue to rely on us. We believe that GITEX will only accelerate the success that we have achieved so far and help us build further momentum for our business in the region.
What will be your theme of participation at GITEX?
Veeam’s participation at GITEX will be centered around the theme ‘Protect, Manage and Unleash Data’. This flows from the fact that besides people, data is the most important asset for any business. Veeam’s simple, flexible and reliable solutions enable organizations to fully exploit their data and drive their business objectives forward.
As part of the annual GITEX Conference, there are panel discussions taking place and I will be participating in the ‘Boosting Efficiency in Business and Industry with 5G’ session where I will elaborate how we support our customers in their business endeavors.
Do you plan to run any online engagements such as webinars in parallel to GITEX?
As mentioned above, Veeam will be participating in one of the GITEX conference panel discussions. Moreover, the event will be available as a webinar-on-demand on the GITEX.VirtualPlatform and any party interested will be able to watch the webinar online.
How is your company weathering from the market effects on the pandemic?
Referring to our Q3 results, Veeam’s business has been developing stably during these past months and we have reported strong results and now have 400,000 customers worldwide. As we continue to implement our business continuity processes, Veeam is operating as normal. Partners and customers are continuing to receive the exemplary levels of service that they are used to, and we are leveraging all the technologies at our disposal to engage and support our community.
Looking at how we are helping our customer operate, as organizations adapt to rapidly evolving working conditions, Veeam helps them ensure that they are able to maintain business continuity by seamlessly protecting their remote workers’ workstations and productivity tools like Microsoft Office 365 and Microsoft Teams along with the rest of their cloud, virtual and physical workloads. Veeam offers many of these software and services free of charge that can be of value to businesses; this freemium model is part of our DNA, and we want to ensure that we help our community protect their data no matter their size or location.
Veeam has also adapted its own business practices to ensure that the company’s support teams are available and able to help customers with any issues. Veeam’s R&D teams are continuing their pace of building innovative products that make managing data as simple, flexible and reliable as possible.
What were the key learnings over the past couple of months and how do you plan to use those to make changes to your regional strategies?
On the employee front, we have realized that it’s very important for the team to stay connected and engaged with each other. I make sure as far as possible that we connect with each other regularly on the phone or via video conference and not just talk about work but also about everyday life and world happenings.
This mirrors the chats that we have with each other at the coffee machine or water cooler in the office which fosters good working relationships. We need to stay as grounded as possible and social interactions across the Middle Eastern team has really helped keep up the morale, vigor and energy during challenging times like this.
On the customer front, we see that the pandemic has only accelerated the digital transformation initiatives of regional organizations as they see the benefit of technology as an enabler of favorable business outcomes. We will continue to consolidate our market leadership by radically simplifying Cloud Data Management for regional enterprises, providing world-class technical solutions, skills and expertise to our partners and supporting customers’ business transformation to future-ready architectures.
