At the annual Perform conference in Las Vegas, Dynatrace created quite a storm outperforming itself with the number of announcements, capabilities and future visions.
From announcing four new capabilities, homing hundreds of case studies from around the world and demonstrating how the impossible is actually possible it’s hard to pick just a few things you should not forget from Dynatrace Perform 2018.
Artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities and efficiency among Dynatrace products brought a spectacular performance in Vegas, demonstrating the possibilities are endless. Focusing on the customers and software perfection, Dynatrace truly keeps these at the core to everything they do. CBR witnessed the show and found five key things every attendee should take away with them, customer or not.
Less is more
Dynatrace set the benchmark for the rest of the performance management market at this year’s Perform event, entering another world of technology. From the outset the company reiterated the point of ease, efficiency and effectiveness and that is not achieved by having a million and one systems at the office.
Instead, Dynatrace put the focus of perfection down to achieving more from less. Incorporating multiple different operating systems and servers into one simple agent enables customers to perform, assess and manage more effectively.
Giving customers one holistic view of their operations, systems, processes and applications not only saves time but drives cost savings significantly. The platform is designed to create a single agent for the customer, so that when deploying AI to solve an error it is resolved much quicker with much more clarity.
Although it sounds so simplistic and too easy to be sufficient, the benefits customers reap from the capabilities are endless. Time, money, energy spent pinpointing errors are costly for a business like Virgin Money exemplified. Dynatrace enabled them to discover the error in a matter of 30 minutes, in comparison to numerous systems taking three days. Quantifying savings in time as well as money are just the basic benefits.
One holistic AI powered view finds the problem as if it’s gold on a treasure map, and enables customers and employees to spend more time at what they’re good at. Developers spend more time innovating and development, leaving the troubleshooting to the tech.
Goal: Perfection
From the outset, Dynatrace made the ethos of the company and its capabilities clear – perfection. Opening day one of the show Dave Anderson said: “At Dynatrace, we love perfection and we’re here because we need software to work perfectly.” It’s safe to say Dynatrace somewhat set an expectation for the remaining time at the conference, but unsurprisingly did not fail to reach and exceed the expected.
Speaking with Anderson, the ethos around perfection came from giving the best possible to customers and perfecting their performance as well as management systems. Trialling its own capabilities on its imperfections, Dynatrace figured there is always more that can be done. Even if it does not seem possible today and there will always be more wanted from a customer and indeed the board of Dynatrace.
Already the performance management company is thinking of what can be done even better that what has been announced over the last two days. Will it ever be enough? Will customers ever have the best of the best or is there really still room for improvement?
Seeing is believing
As the old saying goes, you learn by doing and Dynatrace’s platform is no exception to the rule. Introducing something that has never been offered before, never trusted before and never truly trialled before is daunting for customers – until seen with their own eyes.
Scepticism would perfectly describe the initial starting point for the capabilities, with even large companies such as Virgin Money laughing at the attempt of Dynatrace’s platform. Until trialling and witnessing the capabilities, customers will not believe how it can change their business and customer bases.
Anderson firmly believes at Dynatrace it is about breaking the status quo, being different to what is going on around the market and disrupting all other aspects.
“Within our R&D team the cultural value is to change the status quo, which is what customers need to do. Customers don’t understand what is possible, until you show them. Don’t settle for what we’re doing tomorrow, always think how you can do better for everyone and demonstrate this in an easy way for customers,” Anderson said.
AI first
Doing it the Dynatrace way become somewhat of the famous phrase for the Perform conference this year. Though it does ring true, as no other competitor in the market offers what Dynatrace can do. Whether it is across the full-stack platform or through IoT devices, AI makes up the core of Dynatrace’s capabilities.
Having an all in one platform is just the start for Dynatrace and its customers. The real core of the capability is within the AI system and knowledge, but not like AI is traditionally known. Unlike any other AI technology, the performance management company strives to bring AI capabilities from what they know from experience as opposed to machine learning due to lack of trust.
Whether it’s problem solving, cloud advancements or self-driving platforms, AI is at the heart of Dynatrace’s vision to make it the easiest and most accessible platform for a business. Putting the question as to why choose Dynatrace over any other company to not only the CTO of the company, but partners such as Virgin Money the answer comes back to AI. The efficiency it brings, the quantifiable answers and error solving success rate points in all the right directions for customers.
Steve Tack, SVP of products at Dynatrace, believes the way to be the best and a market leader is by having that edge and being different, he said: “It would be a mistake of ours if we just brought things forward, doing things in the same way. We have to do things differently, not just better.”
Customer Focus
Customers are undoubtedly the most important aspect to Dynatrace’s developments today and in the future. Focusing on what customers want as well as what they need is what should be remembered from Perform 2018, especially if your company is not yet a customer.
Striving to be the market leader, disrupting all different industries Dynatrace has brought together a singular platform with one focus. Ease for customers. Customers do not want to spend hours trawling through systems to find a tiny error, instead time should be spent innovating, developing and creating new ways to boost their business. With Dynatrace, both are possible just the problem searching is left to the systems.
Not only are customers the focus for Dynatrace’s developments, which is important to remember for future business connections, but they are the first port of call for improvements on systems. Take the Management Zones capability for example, this was brought to light as an idea to better performance by as customer themselves and now it is in full swing bettering the way things are done.
Irrelevant of size or purpose, Dynatrace beams difference once again offering customised platforms. Developing capabilities in this capacity well and truly puts the customer at the heart of all the company does, ensuring a happy customer is a long standing customer.
