C2C Connect Live: New York City (full video)

A Warm Welcome from C2C and Google Cloud

Opening the event was Marco ten Vaanholt ( @artmarco ), who leads C2C initiatives at Google Cloud. To kick things off, Marco prompted the audience to get to know each other, and all enthusiastically turned to their table neighbors. After Marco covered the history of C2C and our early adventures in hosting face to face events, Marcy Young ( @Marcy.Young ), Director of Partnerships at C2C, followed to reiterate our mission statement: we're here to connect Google Cloud customers across the globe. 

Since March of 2021, when the C2C online community first launched, our community has grown in size to make valuable connections with people like Arsho Toubi ( @Arsho Toubi ), Customer Engineer, Google Cloud, who followed Young to introduce C2C's partner speakers.

All three introductory speakers emphasized the excitement of being able to make new connections in person again. As ten Vaanholt put it, peers introducing themselves and initiating new relationships is "the start of community building." When Toubi announced "I received some business cards, and that was a fun experience I haven't had in two years," the room responded with a knowing laugh. Toubi also asked the Googlers in the room to stand up so others could identify them. "These are my colleagues," she said. "We're all here to help you navigate how to use GCP to your best advantage."

Getting to Know AMD and DoiT

C2C partners and the sponsors for this event, DoiT and  @AMD  shared updates of the partnership between the two companies focused on cloud optimization.

• Michael Brzezinski ( @mike.brzezinski ), Global Sales Manager, AMD
• Spenser Paul ( @spenserpaul ), Head of Global Alliances, DoiT

Brzezinski framed the two presentations as a response to a question he received from another attendee he met just before taking the stage, a question about how the two companies work together to enhance performance while reducing cost. One half of the answer is AMD's compute processors, which Brzezinski introduced one by one. To complete the story of the partnership between the two companies, Spenser Paul of DoiT took the stage with his Labrador Milton. "I'm joining the stage with a dog, which means you won't hear anything I'm saying from here on," he said as he took the microphone. "And that's totally okay." The key to minimizing cost on AMD's hardware, Paul explained, is DoiT's Flexsave offering, which automates compute spend based on identified need within a workload.

A Fireside Chat with DoiT and Current

• Spenser Paul, Head of Global Alliances, DoiT
• Trevor Marshall ( @tmarshall ), Chief Technology Officer, Current

Paul invited Marshall to join him onstage, and both took a seat facing the audience, Milton resting down at Paul's feet. After asking Marshall to give a brief introduction to Current, Paul asked him why Current chose Google Cloud. Marshall did not mince words: Current accepted a $100,000 credit allowance from Google after spending the same amount at AWS. Why did Current stay with Google Cloud? The Google Kubernetes Engine. "I like to say we came for the credits, but stayed for Kubernetes," Marshall said. Paul wryly suggested the line be used for a marketing campaign. The conversation continued through Current's journey to scale and its strategy around cost optimization along the way.

When Paul opened questions to the audience, initially, none came up. Seeing an opportunity, Paul turned to Marshall and said, "Selfishly, I need to ask you: what's going to happen with crypto?" Just in time, a guest asked what other functionalities Current will introduce in the future. After an optimistic but tight-lipped response from Marshall, another moment passed. Marshall offered Paul a comforting hand and said, "We're all going to make it through," before fielding a few more questions.

Panel Discussion 

All our presenters, with the addition of Michael Beal ( @MikeBeal ), CEO, Data Capital Management reconvened on stage for a panel discussion. Toubi, who moderated the conversation, began by asking Michael Beal to introduce himself and his company, Data Capital Management, which uses AI to automate the investment process. Beal ran through Data Capital Management's product development journey, and then, when he recalled the company's initial approach from Google, playfully swatted Marshall and said, "The credits don't hurt." Toubi then guided Beal and Brzezinski through a discussion of different uses cases for High Performance Computing, particularly on AMD's processors.

When Toubi turned the panel's attention to costs, Paul took the lead to explain in practical detail how DoiT's offerings facilitate the optimization process. "I have an important question," said Toubi. "Can DoiT do my taxes?" Then she put the guests on the spot to compare Google Cloud to AWS's Graviton. Brzezinski was ready for the question. The initial cost savings Graviton provides, he explained, don't translate to better price performance when taking into account the improved overall performance on Google Cloud. Other questions covered financial services use cases for security, additional strategies for optimizing workloads for price performance, and wish-list items for Google Cloud financing options.

Marco ten Vaanholt kicked off the audience Q&A by asking what a Google Cloud customer community can do for the customers on the panel. Marshall said he's interested in meeting talented developers, and Beal said he's interested in meeting anyone who can give him ideas. As he put it, "Inspiration is always a very interesting value proposition." After a couple more questions about estimating cost at peak performance and addressing customer pain points, Toubi asked each panelist to offer one piece of advice for someone considering using Google Cloud who isn't already. Again, Paul saw a shot and took it. "If you've never been to Google before," he said, "Come for the credits, stay for the Kubernetes."
 

Winding Down

Following the presentations, all in attendance broke away to connect during a networking reception. To read more about it, check out the exclusive onsite report linked below in the Extra Credit section, and to get involved in the customer-to-customer connections happening in person in the C2C community, follow the link to our live event in Cambridge, MA to register and attend. We look forward to seeing you there!

Extra Credit