5 Reasons To Visit VMworld 2019: A Pivotal Insiders’ Guide To The Show

August 21, 2019 Courtney McShane

As everyone wraps up their summer, refreshed from vacation and sunshine, there’s no better way to get back into the cloud-native groove than VMworld 2019. The crowds converge on San Francisco next week, and it’s shaping up to be a don’t-miss ticket for all things Kubernetes. 

Pivotal’s PKS collaboration and partnership with VMware continues to gain momentum as the best way to deploy and operate Kubernetes in your VMware environment. So, naturally Pivotal and Pivotal Container Service (PKS) will have a large presence at the conference. But VMworld is a massive conference with so much going on! To give you an inside track, we’ve put together Pivotal’s 5 top tips to help you make the most of your time at the conference:

1. Come Say “Hi”, Grab a Book and Learn In a Mini Breakout At Our Booth

One the expo floor, look for for the Pivotal teal and you’ll find us. Of course, we’ll be talking Kubernetes and PKS, but we’re also focused on what you can run atop Kubernetes to deliver developer and business value. We’ll be talking Pivotal Application Service/Cloud Foundry, CI/CD, Building container images, service mesh, Java Spring, Kubernetes Marketplace, FaaS, Kubernetes appliances on VxRail and much much more. You can also check out the schedule of on-booth mini-breakouts or drop by for an in-person demo or whiteboarding session with our resident Kubernetes experts. We’ll be handing out the popular O’Reilly books and other great swag. 

2. Fill Up On Kubernetes In The Breakouts

VMworld is packed full of Kubernetes insights with over 90 breakout sessions dedicated to getting the most of container orchestration in your business.

Complementing this platform smorgasbord, Pivotal’s recent “Build on Kubernetes” announcements are featured in a breakout session with Cornelia Davis, author, Pivotal VP of Technology, and expert on Kubernetes. Based on her experience helping large organizations develop their K8s approach, Cornelia will explore what you should be thinking about once you have deployed Kubernetes in order to get developers productive and deliver business value. She may even have a few copies of her book to giveaway…! 

Speaker: Cornelia Davis, VP Technology, Pivotal
When: Monday, Aug 26 3:30-4:30 pm
Session ID: KUB4298BUS

Windows Server 2008 comes to the end of its support life in 2020, and many organizations are looking for a new home for their .NET applications, Enter PKS 1.5. In this talk, learn how Enterprise PKS offers a secure, scalable, and customizable Kubernetes solution and how to design and deploy Windows containers.

Speaker: Kartik Lunkad, Senior Product Manager, Pivotal
When: Monday, Aug 26 5:30- 6.30pm
Session ID: KUBB1995BU

Kubernetes is an amazing technology, but it’s nothing without the right infrastructure to support its operation. And that infrastructure can take time to build and perfect. Luckily a combined team of extremely intelligent people at VMware, Dell and Pivotal have engineered and tested a validated design architecture, so you don’t need to. We call it Pivotal Ready Architecture (PRA). Plus all the technology comes from the Dell Technology family so you can be confident we’ve got you covered for any integration issues. 

This talk will discuss containers making their way to data centers everywhere and the underlying hardware architecture which his team has specifically designed to support Kubernetes workloads and help organizations balance both VMs and K8s.  

Speaker: Chad Dunn, VP Product Management VxRail, Dell/EMC
When: Wednesday, Aug 28 9:30-10:30am
Session ID: KUB4114BU

3. Go Cloud-Native With VMware

If you’re excited to get the latest take on Kubernetes in the enterprise, VMworld is the only place to be.  From VMware Craig McKluckie, co-founder of Kubernetes and Heptio and Paul Fazzone, SVP for Cloud-Native Apps will take the stage to discuss Kubernetes and the Cloud-Native journey in a world where leading enterprises bring innovation to the world by building software.  There are over 90 breakouts and {code} sessions offered on the topic of Kubernetes at VMworld, half-day workshops, and hands-on labs. In VMware’s own booth, they will be hosting Book Signings on Monday and Wednesday and the opportunity to dig in deep with their experts.  There is also an invitation-only Cloud-Native Happy Hour hosted on Monday night. The lineup of activities can be found here.

4. Take a Whole Stack Perspective With The Dell Technology Family

Look out for the Pivotal Ready Architecture sign at the Dell Technology booth. There you’ll find experts from Dell/EMC, VMware and Pivotal ready to talk about how you can rapidly build an on-premises cloud-native powerhouse in your own datacenter. Pivotal Ready Architecture combines the best of breed VxRail, vSphere and PKS technology in a best practice architecture validated by Pivotal. And this year our jointly engineered solutions goes one step further; stay tuned for the announcement or swing by the booth to get the scoop first-hand.

Pivotal Platform Architects will be at the Dell Technologies booth (#1027) with a pod dedicated to Pivotal Ready Architecture. There will also be presentations hosted within the booth, including one from  David Appel, Director for Defense and Civil Solutions at Raytheon (Tuesday 8/27 12.45pm).  Learn about how the Dell Tech family works together to make your life simpler from a customer who has experienced the full Dell Technologies suite of solutions first-hand.    

Flip the channel to TheCUBE to hear Gil Shneorson, SVP and GM VxRail and Raytheon live discussing the future of hyper-converged infrastructure and PKS on Wednesday, Aug 28th at 11am PST. Also on TheCUBE on Wednesday, Aug 28th 10.30am PST you’ll have a chance to hear Varun Chhabra, VP of Product for Dell Technologies Cloud Platform and John Allwright, Director of Product at Pivotal talk about how Dell Technology Cloud, Pivotal Container Service and VMware combine to simplify Kubernetes in customers’ data centers.

It’s a Party!  The CONVERGED User Group is hosting a soiree at Fogo de Chão on Monday, August 26, at 6:00pm. For those who love to nerd out on hyper-converged infrastructure conversations, this event is for you.  There will be customer interviews, roadmap updates from product experts, and a most luxurious dinner with HCI’s most passionate customers and experts. Tickets are nearly sold out for this event so if you haven’t already signed up, be sure to do so today. #getCONVERGED. Panelists include: Suzan Pickett, Vice President for Converged Infrastructure, U.S. Bank, David Appel, Director for Defense and Civil Solutions, Raytheon, Nigel Moulton, CTO EMEA, Dell EMC as moderator.

5. Go Deeper At Pivotal’s HQ, a Short Stroll From VMworld 

Seeing is believing, as the saying goes.  Watch extreme agile methodology in action at our office a short 4 min walk from Moscone Center.  Four of our executives - James Watters, Cornelia Davis, Chad Sakac, and Michael Wood are scheduled to host guests with an intro presentation and lab tour to follow.  Space is limited to a first-come, first-serve basis. Labs Tour Sign Up.

Dell’s Own Digital Transformation Story        Michael Wood     Monday 11-12pm
Transform Your Business, not just IT                 James Watters    Tuesday 11-12pm
The Future of Managing Containers                 Cornelia Davis    Tuesday 3-4pm
The Evolution of Pivotal                                         Chad Sakac           Wednesday 11-12pm 

All of our top executives will be in one place at the same time, a rare and exceptional treat.  In coordination with our friends at VMware, we will be offering 1:1 meetings with our executives throughout the conference.  Work with your Pivotal or VMware rep to reserve a time. 

Send us some love on Twitter @Pivotal by featuring a good quote and picture from one of these sessions.  Be sure to visit our Platform Architects live at the Pivotal Booth and Dell Technologies ISG Booth throughout the show. 

See you there!

(Can’t make it to VMworld 2019? Check out live-stream highlights.)

 

About the Author

Courtney McShane

Courtney is a Program Director at Pivotal. Courtney is dedicated to accelerating growth among strategic partners Dell EMC and VMware as a part of Pivotal's Dell Tech Synergy team. She spent 5 years at legacy EMC in Tech Marketing and most recently drove sales as Director of Business Development for a portfolio of construction companies in the Energy space.

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