Interview with Red Hat’s Phil Andrews

For the ‘Bridging The Gap Between Technology And Business,’ Special Feature, Phil Andrews, VP CEMEA, Red Hat, was interviewed by Rabab Zehra, Executive Editor of TECHx Media, to learn more about Red Hat’s role in the ongoing wave of digital transformation.

TECHx: How has Red Hat supported the regional business ecosystem, especially now that the world is still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic?

Phil : The pandemic’s impacts have been well documented, and Red Hat has supported the regional business ecosystem throughout the recent difficulties by continuing to deliver its Open  Source software and support services and training both on-site where regulations permit but remotely where physical on-premise presence is not allowed. Continuing to support customers with mission-critical IT systems and projects without missing a beat has enabled customers to use Red Hat’s supported Open Source products to accelerate their journey into digital on-line delivery of their services and products which has protected their businesses.

Red Hat has also helped the regional business ecosystem adapt to the new normal of cloud and online-based service delivery. Red Hat’s cloud offerings have provided invaluable operational flexibility and facilitated increased efficiency through innovative operating systems, container platforms and management & automation tools. At the same time, widespread adoption of Red Hat open source tools and methodologies within the ecosystem has resulted in businesses’ existing applications becoming more resilient and cloud-ready, positioning them to operate in scaleable hybrid cloud environments.

TECHx: What are some of the biggest obstacles you face today in providing seamless use of technology to your clients?

Phil : To ensure clients capitalize on the benefits that cloud and transformations technologies offer, there are three areas of focus:-

1.People– Red Hat developed its “Open Innovation Labs” Service offering using Open Source principles to assist companies in developing the right practices to ensure that their employees are encouraged to work in creative multi-disciplinary teams to develop new online solutions and services for their customers. Encouraging and enabling innovation and creativity is one of the keys to developing the next generation of software assets that create and support new service and product offerings to help to survive the new normal and proactively grow new business.

2.Process – Continuing that approach assisting the customers to address improvements in critical processes such as Software Development – by implementing approaches such as “DevOps”, and also promoting Automation of IT and Network support processes to improve operational efficiency and developer productivity in times of limited technical staff availability.

3.Architecture-Helping the customers to evolve their IT architecture to be cloud-ready, to support next-generation container-based applications, with the right integration and API management strategy to support the building of next-generation software assets which use existing legacy applications and integrate those functions with new cloud-based services such a geolocation services, payment platforms,  online transaction and data services. By creating the right architectures, the creation and deployment of new applications and software products become seamless and ultra effective.

TECHx: What is the company’s most distinguishing feature that sets it apart from its competitors?

Phil : Red Hat with its Open Source history and heritage aspires to be a catalyst for communities of clients, contributors, partners, and talent by helping to create and deliver world-class technology from which they can learn and harness their potential. Red Hat’s robust enterprise-class open source technology is one of the most distinguishable features as this portfolio drives innovation in a fast manner, bridges the digital divide, empowers people and projects, in a sustainable form for enterprise customers. Red Hat’s continued commitment to always drive any developments and changes to eventually reach into the community products enables users to also harness the community Open Source products to work with and test with Open Source technologies at minimum cost.  Moreover, the convergence of new technologies, such as AI, Blockchain, IoT, Mobile operating environments, and big data analytics are all areas that open source technology has enabled to exist.

.TECHx: What role does the channel partner ecosystem play in your company? In the face of a changing business landscape, how does Red Hat channel empower its partners?

Phil : Red Hat not only empowers every individual partner but also its entire partner ecosystem through its supported open source technologies, which enable Enterprise-Class projects to evolve at lower cost levels and is also stimulating the creation and adoption of Edge Based computing models.  Because code is freely accessible rather than being embargoed internally, people and organizations adopt and contribute to the code – bringing new ideas, fresh perspectives, greater creativity, and unlocking innovation potential through an open-source mindset which eventually finds their way into the Supported and Maintained Enterprise-Class versions of the Open Source code.

The pandemic was previously mentioned, and this is once again relevant as Red Hat has worked closely with every partner throughout this period. For example, increased remote working, higher use of digital channels, and heightened data collection and analytics have all placed workloads on the IT organizations and accelerated the adoption of digital engagement, which has also generated new opportunities for both the customer to adapt and change their businesses to thrive and creating opportunity for the Ecosystem partners supporting this Digital journey of the customer.