5 Companies That Came To Win This Week

For the week ending June 21, CRN takes a look at the companies that brought their 'A' game to the channel.

The Week Ending June 21

Topping this week's roundup of companies that came to win is Hewlett Packard Enterprise for a number of ground-breaking technology, as-a-service and channel announcements from its HPE Discover 2019 conference.

Also making the list were VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger, who was recognized by Glassdoor as the best CEO in America; NetApp for its new consumption-based storage pricing and other hybrid computing moves; Data protection tech startup Druva, for raising an impressive $130 million in financing to fuel its growth; and Google for pledging $1 billion to help ease the shortage of affordable housing in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Not everyone in the IT industry was making smart moves this week, of course. For a rundown of companies that were unfortunate, unsuccessful or just didn't make good decisions, check out this week's Five Companies That Had A Rough Week roundup.

HPE Pushes The Innovation Envelope At Discover 2019

Hewlett Packard Enterprise was at the top of its game this week, showing off its technological prowess at the company's HPE Discover 2019 conference and doubling down on its commitment to its channel partners.

On the technology front HPE debuted its new HPE Primera storage platform, combining the InfoSight AI technology from its Nimble line with the reliability of its 3Par family, and launching a new generation of the company's Aruba Central network management systems outfitted with artificial intelligence-based analytics.

HPE also said it is stepping up sales of its fast-growing GreenLake pay-per-use model with a pledge to transform its entire portfolio to as-a-service by 2022. A new GreenLake midmarket offering is available now and will target a sweet spot of $300,000 but can stretch down to $100,000 depending on configurations and customer need. The company also had lots to offer partners, such as its new Channel to Edge Institute, which aims to educate partners to take advantage of edge computing market opportunities.

President and CEO Antonio Neri (pictured) even indulged in a little trash-talking about competitors, calling Dell Technologies' cloud platform a "bad imitation" of HPE GreenLake.

VMware's Pat Gelsinger Voted Best CEO In America: Glassdoor

VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger had a good week after users on Glassdoor, the popular job listing and workplace rating site, voted him the best CEO in America in 2019. Gelsinger received an astounding 99 percent approval rating from users on Glassdoor.

Gelsinger was the No. 1 executive in CRN's 2018 Top 100 Executives list. He has revamped his company's innovation strategy and boosted its sales and channel momentum. He is also well-known for his charity work.

NetApp Expands Hybrid Cloud Tech With Consumption-Based IT, New HCI Cloud Ties

NetApp made a strategic move this week with its plan to offer consumption-based pricing for its storage technology in public and private clouds. That model, combined with several technology advancements, will provide NetApp with leverage to bring hybrid cloud computing to its customers.

The new consumption pricing model, which relies on the new NetApp Fabric Orchestration Toolkit that lets customers see everything in the Data Fabric platform, allows customers to pay for storage assets as a service in the same way they pay for cloud services on a per-gigabyte basis and based on the desired class of service.

NetApp unveiled major enhancements to the company's private cloud capabilities via its HCI hyper-converged infrastructure technology, including a new NetApp Kubernetes Service on HCI, to help customers run new cloud data services on the HCI systems. NetApp also expanded the ability to work with public clouds with the general availability of NetApp Cloud Volume Ontap on Google Cloud Platform.

Data Protection Vendor Druva Raises $130 Million In Push Toward IPO

Data protection and data management tech developer Druva scored big in venture financing when it closed on a $130 million funding round this week.

Druva will use the new financing to accelerate its product development efforts, boost customer service capabilities and geographically expand sales efforts: The company now generates about 20 percent of its revenue from outside North America and plans to increase that to 30 percent over the next two years.

Druva founder and CEO Jaspreet Singh said the company is likely headed for an IPO sometime within the next 12 to 18 months.

Google Pledges $1 Billion To Help Ease Bay Area Housing Crisis

Google wins applause this week for its plan to commit $1 billion to help ease the San Francisco Bay Area housing crisis that has squeezed out low- and middle-income residents and even some of the company's own workers.

Google's offer is expected to support the development of as many as 20,000 new homes in the Bay Area, according to CEO Sundar Pichai, where Google is one of the largest employers.

Over the next 10 years Google will repurpose at least $750 million of Google-owned land, most of which is zoned for office or commercial space, as residential housing. That could make room for at least 15,000 new homes.

Google also will establish a $250 million investment fund to provide developer incentives to build at least another 5,000 affordable housing units. The company also pledged $50 million in Google.org grants for nonprofits that help homeless and displaced people.