How Cisco supports digitization in the public sector

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Speaker 1: You're listening to B to B Tech Talk with Ingram Micro, 2 - > a place to learn about how to grow your business 3 - > and stay ahead of technological advances before they've become mainstream. 4 - > This episode is sponsored by Ingram Micro's Expantage, the Next 5 - > Level way to transform your business's potential and reshape how 6 - > customers see you through advanced transactional data. 7 - >

Speaker 2: Let's get into it. 8 - >

Speaker 3: Welcome to B to B Tech Talk with Ingram Micro. 9 - > I'm your host Shelby Skirhawk, and our guest today is 10 - > Tony Celeste, executive director and general manager for Ingram Micro 11 - > Public Sector. Tony, welcome, Hey. 12 - >

Speaker 2: Thank you, Shelby. It's great to be here with you. 13 - >

Speaker 3: Thank you. Well. Today we are talking about the public 14 - > sector with Cisco and Ingram Micro. But first let's go 15 - > ahead and define some things specifically, what does the public 16 - > sector entail? 17 - >

Speaker 2: Sure, Well, the public sector refers tonment funded and operational 18 - > entities responsible for serving the public good right, so citizen services. 19 - > For Cisco and Ingram Micro. This specifically includes the federal 20 - > government that's the civilian AGC's Department of Defense, the US 21 - > Intelligence community, State, local and municipal governments right, state and 22 - > local state agencies, local municipalities, public safety departments, education both 23 - > K through twelve and higher education, so you're universities and 24 - > community colleges. And then public health care hospitals, clinics, systems 25 - > funded and managed by government agencies. So that's how we 26 - > focus it in these organizations generally focus on citizen services, 27 - > critical infrastructure, emergency response, and then national security and defense. 28 - >

Speaker 3: Yeah. Okay, that's a broad range then, and it's an 29 - > important range too, Yeah for sure. Well, so kind of 30 - > starting at the beginning then, So for a partner that 31 - > hasn't done much with the public sector, let's first understand 32 - > what's important to understand about how the public sector works 33 - > with vendors and partners and companies like Ingram, micro like, 34 - > you know, it's the opportunity is huge there. So what 35 - > should they know about working with the public sector. How 36 - > do you get started? What are some of the rules there? 37 - >

Speaker 2: Well, I think one thing that's nice about the public 38 - > sector is first and foremost are common needs. You know, 39 - > they all have a desire for security, they all have 40 - > a need to scale, and they are mission driven in 41 - > terms of the technology solutions that they're looking for. I 42 - > think the real challenge is how is public sector really 43 - > different from commercial and what are the impacts to the 44 - > selling motion. And so when you look at these things, 45 - > it uses taxpayer funded budgets and associated with that or 46 - > strict spending and acquisition rules and regulations, it requires an 47 - > understanding of the mandatory requirements for competition also the unique 48 - > requirements from a regulatory and a technology compliance perspective. So 49 - > think of it this way. On the federal government, you 50 - > have something called the Federal Acquisition Regulations, and then you 51 - > have state and local laws that you have to conform with. 52 - > And then from a technology perspective, you can have things 53 - > like Trade Agreement Act compliance or security certifications like FedRAMP, 54 - > or supply chain requirements like the Cybersecurity Model Certification CMMC. 55 - > And then lastly, there's this requirement for transparency and auditability 56 - > and that makes sometimes organizations nervous. Yes, well I could 57 - > go on with some other things, but why don't I 58 - > stop there? 59 - >

Speaker 3: Well, okay, so that need for transparency, what specifically does 60 - > that mean? 61 - >

Speaker 2: Well, you have to assume that information potentially is going 62 - > to be made public. When they go out and they 63 - > are asking for requirements, they are looking for competition in 64 - > the marketplace. So government comes back and wants to review 65 - > the business that you've done with them. You have to 66 - > be prepared to be transparent about that and that business 67 - > and how you're conducting yourselves in the marketplace is auditable. 68 - > One of the other areas is important to mention is 69 - > you know the size and the complexity of the missions 70 - > inside government. These are large scale, high stakes challenge is 71 - > that they're trying to address. And the more demanding technical 72 - > requirements in the public sector tend to be around security, reliability, resilience, 73 - > and the owner's life cycle that technology has to be 74 - > managed over. 75 - >

Speaker 3: So when let's talk a little bit about how to 76 - > work with the public sector with the government, and let's 77 - > go ahead and bring in kind of a real world 78 - > scenario here. Say that you are a public sector, a 79 - > municipal government maybe well maybe more of a state government 80 - > that does rely on federal funds. As we know with 81 - > the Department of Government Governmental Efficiency. You know, there's been 82 - > a lot of change, there's been some volatility. So when 83 - > there are cuts that are being discussed kind of on 84 - > a daily basis, how does that affect technolology spending for 85 - > those people in the public sector, and then how does 86 - > a partner deal with that? 87 - >

Speaker 2: Yeah, so those are all really good points. But before 88 - > we get into addressing some of the immediate let's talk 89 - > a little bit about how Cisco and Ingram micro can help. 90 - > So first and then in bridging the gap on just 91 - > the normal course of doing business in the US public sectors. 92 - > So we act as a bridge through enablement training, helping 93 - > them navigate those procurement complexities of rules and regulations. We 94 - > try to offer tailored solutions that address mission requirements and 95 - > are partner ready, and then we provide scale financing and 96 - > tailored support. So there's probably a handful of areas that 97 - > you could break that down. So that goes into things 98 - > like partner enablement and acceleration of those deals, shrinking the 99 - > sales cycle when competition is needed, and then specifically taking 100 - > a look at Cisco's programs, they integrate seamlessly into Ingram 101 - > and we support them robustly through our new Exvantage platform, 102 - > so that provides assistance. Then the contract vehicles and procurement readiness. 103 - > Those are critical how they're going to acquire the technology, 104 - > and we have access to those contract vehicles. Either we 105 - > hold them directly and facilitate those transactions for our partner network, 106 - > or our partners hold them directly and we facilitate those 107 - > that way, and then financing life cycle support as well 108 - > as cybersecurity compliance. And then most importantly is that quote 109 - > unquote mission focus being able to link our partners, like 110 - > Cisco's technological innovation to driving mission outcomes, whether it's student success, 111 - > citizen safety, or national security. Those are going to be 112 - > critical now to your question at hand, right the impacts 113 - > of government efficiency initiatives, budget cuts, what's happening with dose overall? 114 - > This is a bit of a crazy time. It's highly disruptive. 115 - > Government spending though has been on the rise for some time, 116 - > but IT investment has remained really relatively flat therely keeping 117 - > up with inflation. So the missed opportunity is here is 118 - > it could actually drive greater efficiency and ROI through improve 119 - > citizen services, better national security of first responder support, healthier 120 - > communities and veteran care, and enhanced education. The real issue 121 - > is is you know what everybody's experiencing right now with 122 - > this disruption and the irony is cost cutting goals are 123 - > more achievable with greater strategic IT investments. Yeah, so it's 124 - > really been an interesting dynamic and this has put everybody 125 - > a bit back on their heels. 126 - >

Speaker 3: Right, right, and that seems like certainly a theme overall 127 - > in the industry. You know, digital transformation was the topic, 128 - > you know, a few years ago. And where in the 129 - > private sector they're they're at that point. Where would you say, 130 - > then the public sector is because you're right, there is 131 - > a lot of inefficiency and we know there's a lot 132 - > of manual analog processes. So where's the public sector compared 133 - > to the private sector in terms of you know, what 134 - > we think of as digital transformation? 135 - >

Speaker 2: Yeah, well they're behind how much? Yeah, So if you 136 - > think about it today, seventy to eighty percent of the 137 - > IT budgets are tied to maintaining outdated systems, so they 138 - > go to maintenance and support, they go to sustainment of existence. 139 - > That leads a very small percentage of the discretionary budgets 140 - > that exist in the public sector sphere to go towards 141 - > driving real either new systems or new services or new implementations. 142 - > So the results as you might imagine aging air traffic 143 - > control system which we've all heard about, deeper based processes. Still, 144 - > the example of retirement records in file cabinets and taking 145 - > months to work a retirement package for a retiring federal employee. 146 - > So these are just a handful of examples there, but 147 - > it has to be viewed as a fault force multiplier 148 - > to reduce waste, improve outcomes, increase public trust. That's where Ingram, 149 - > Micro Public Sector and Cisco come into play because we 150 - > help our partners deliver solutions that are mission ready, align 151 - > with the funding compliance frameworks, and provide tangible modernization outcomes 152 - > that afford the customer truly a transformative digital solution, right right. 153 - >

Speaker 3: You mentioned the filing cabinets in our kind of pulling 154 - > the curtain back in our pre call. You know, when 155 - > we first met and chatted, you said something about Iron Mountain. 156 - > What does that tell us? 157 - >

Speaker 2: Okay, So in Boyer, Pa, there's a facility. It's maintained 158 - > inside an old lime mine, and in it is nothing 159 - > but paper records. 160 - >

Speaker 3: So literally aligne mine. 161 - >

Speaker 2: An old long line and it is now it's been 162 - > outfitted to preserve paper records and it is filled with 163 - > lined with filing cabinets of records, paper records, and then 164 - > those are manually processed for government workers for their retirement packages. Wow, 165 - > and it takes six months to do it. So imagine 166 - > if you could digitize all that information operate it either 167 - > in the cloud or in a private data center, and 168 - > process that in days were hours versus months or half 169 - > a year. 170 - >

Speaker 3: Yeah, that's kind of mind boggling to think that one 171 - > that there are still paper systems, but two that they 172 - > are such literally varied filing processes that there is such 173 - > inefficiency there. But that being able to update that takes technology, 174 - > and that technology takes updating. And I guess coming full 175 - > circle to what we're talking about today with Cisco, So 176 - > can you kind of give us maybe it's just a 177 - > specific example, but can you give some one on one 178 - > on how Cisco fuels the public sector? I mean in 179 - > terms of cloud and like, yeah, I guess if you 180 - > want to use you know, ditchizing paper or something like that. 181 - >

Speaker 2: Yeah, I do. But one of the things that were 182 - > speaking to that example that kind of speaks to what 183 - > we're seeing in the marketplace today. There's been policy and 184 - > regulatory requirements in the government, and the government eats big 185 - > and maybe less understood by the citizens that they serve. 186 - > And so the shifting priorities with the new administration, tariffs, 187 - > DOGE reforms, you know, this budget uncertainty, continuing resolutions and 188 - > coming in trying to place these big, bold bats to 189 - > drive this transformation. It's really going to require a lot 190 - > of collaboration and partnership to navigate the storm in the 191 - > short term. And I think it's important to send this 192 - > message to partners before we talk about the Cisco enablement, 193 - > that the concerns they're having are valid in their widespread 194 - > but the demand isn't going away. It's just being reshaped. 195 - > Agencies still need secure infrastructure, they need modernized systems. They 196 - > have to transform what they're doing to improve education, healthcare, 197 - > public safety, and national security. And many are planning now 198 - > strategically for the future when the funding is unlocked, and 199 - > so Cisco and Ingram Micro we're preparing to help our 200 - > partners navigate that with government buying insights and demand signals, 201 - > helping them navigate contracts and funding prepackaged scalable solutions, flexible proturement, 202 - > life cycle services. And we're shifting from this short term 203 - > transaction mindset to long term positioning. And then so I 204 - > want to, you know, after saying that, kind of give 205 - > you the chance to go back to your question you 206 - > were asking of me, Well, how does Cisco fuel the 207 - > public sector and what role does Cisco play well the 208 - > first thing I would say is broad and deep technological innovation. 209 - > And when you think about the different technologies that Cisco 210 - > innovates around, it's AI, right and observability of information. It's 211 - > networking and communications both wired and wired, bliss, its collaboration, 212 - > its edge to core computing and integrated and security. So 213 - > those things play in all of the areas we're going 214 - > to talk about, which are government digital transformation of citizen services, 215 - > infrastructure modernization, the public safety and emergency response, cybersecurity from 216 - > zero trust, this cyber security framework fed RAMP you name it, 217 - > state ramp, and then national security tactical ledge, healthcare you know, 218 - > secure hybrid workplaces protecting patient data, and then education hybrid learning, 219 - > connected campuses. So all of those areas are areas that 220 - > Cisco is enabling our partners to deliver on the mission 221 - > of the public sector. 222 - >

Speaker 3: And all of those pieces that you mentioned about AI 223 - > and the cloud and networking and wired and wireless, those 224 - > are all specific Cisco solutions. You know, as you were 225 - > mentioning those, I can think back to the episodes that 226 - > we've had about these specific Cisco solutions and understanding those. 227 - > I hate to jump around, but I want to go 228 - > back to what you said about prepackaged solutions. That so 229 - > understanding what the literal Cisco options are. If we were 230 - > to just kind of generalize it and say, yeah, all 231 - > of those areas that you just mentioned, Cisco has technology 232 - > solutions for knowing the breadth of the products. I guess 233 - > I don't want to call it products, you know, the 234 - > breadth of Cisco when you say working on mission focused 235 - > outcomes and prepackaged solutions and basically getting ready for when 236 - > you know, I don't know, things settled down. You know, 237 - > I guess can you come back to that and speak 238 - > to that, because I think that's something that the partner, uh, 239 - > they are probably anticipating that for their public sector customer, 240 - > you know, the administrator, the CTO, so to speak for 241 - > a one piece of the government. They might have to 242 - > say to you know, say okay, let's go for it, 243 - > let's go ahead and start. But the partner is thinking, oh, well, 244 - > you know, they're not ready, so so I'm not going 245 - > to do anything. How is that, I guess the wrong thinking. 246 - >

Speaker 2: We need to look at it as how the dynamics 247 - > have changed. So it was five years ago little now 248 - > that when we went into the pandemic and everybody working 249 - > from their offices were pushed out to working from the home, 250 - > and this chain how not only how people were working 251 - > with one another, but how their data and information flowed 252 - > throughout their organizations. Well, now fast forward, we're now going 253 - > back to working from offices and there are mandates for 254 - > government to come back to those offices and work well. 255 - > The infrastructure inside those offices has languished. It's five plus 256 - > years old, so you're likely looking at the need to 257 - > refresh the wireless environment and the connectivity within those buildings, 258 - > the wired infrastructure, the data flows are going to flow differently. 259 - > If you're looking at now, there's been a big push 260 - > to doing a lot in the cloud, but with new 261 - > technologies coming and emerging like AI and the increased cyber 262 - > threat now brings back the desire and the interest in 263 - > more of a hybrid environment where data centers and computing 264 - > resources closer to the users who are now back to 265 - > office may make more sense from an efficiency standpoint. So 266 - > all of these things will drive increased demand to increase 267 - > innovation and represent opportunities in the future for both Cisco, 268 - > Ingram Micro and our partners. 269 - >

Speaker 3: For the skeptic listening, how much has the technology changed 270 - > in five years. 271 - >

Speaker 2: Well, it's changed dramatically. Just look at what AI and 272 - > large language models are doing to computing, storage and driving 273 - > the need for more processing power, more capabilities. They're also 274 - > driving the need and generating war data and war information, 275 - > which now you need more ways of storing it, greater resiliency, 276 - > protecting it, archiving it. All of these things continue to 277 - > perpetuate itself, and so when you look at technologies being 278 - > optimized to enhance and take advantage of that now to 279 - > double edged short our adversaries and those bad actors out 280 - > there that want to do people horre and realize dependency 281 - > on information technology continues to grow, and therefore cyber security 282 - > and security is top of mind and one of the 283 - > big continued investment areas across federal, state and local and healthcare. 284 - > I mean, how do you protect that information? 285 - >

Speaker 3: So back to the initial premise five years where a 286 - > lot of the I mean literally think of an office, 287 - > that office that was buzzing every day, that was five 288 - > years ago, thinking okay, we need to move everything to 289 - > the cloud. You literally put a pause on that. Everybody 290 - > leaves that office vacates. That's that technology sits the remote 291 - > capabilities that of course you know had to ramp up 292 - > very quickly. But for the stuff that was in office, Yeah, 293 - > and that's why I asked, you know, for the cynic 294 - > that uh that is saying, you know, it really hasn't. 295 - > I mean, you know, this technology that I had, you know, 296 - > it was just updated you know, before the COVID, before 297 - > the pandemic. We don't need a whole new technology stack 298 - > just because it's been sitting for five years. So so yeah, 299 - > you're right that it has changed dramatically. 300 - >

Speaker 2: You just look at just client yeah right, and it's 301 - > in what client device is now with AI capabilities and 302 - > new technology sitting inside those client devices enable from a 303 - > personal assistant capability of what you're able to do with it. 304 - > And so now take that at scale when you're looking 305 - > at the enterprise and you bring people in and you're 306 - > trying to ingest data and move data around throughout your 307 - > organization and do it securely. So technology as a whole 308 - > changes very rapidly, and so within five years that technology 309 - > would have been completely refreshed, maybe twice. So yeah, there's 310 - > going to be a lot of opportunity as we see 311 - > these new priorities shifts. 312 - >

Speaker 3: So for the partner that is hearing this you know, 313 - > they see that opportunity. How do you do I don't 314 - > mean to make it a specific sales pitch, but how 315 - > does a partner talk to you know, this person in 316 - > the public sector that has some decision making capability. How 317 - > do you convince them that there is action to take 318 - > and that things can get started now instead of waiting 319 - > till you know, so to speak, everything calms down. 320 - >

Speaker 2: Yeah, the conversation has to You have to always be 321 - > empathetic to change and change being disruptive. But first and foremost, 322 - > if you bring it back to the agency and the 323 - > agency specific mission, it's going to resonate. It has to 324 - > because that's what they're ultimately there to do. And so 325 - > for the partner, I would say, first and foremost, do 326 - > your homework. Don't go in to talk to a customer 327 - > completely blind and say, oh, tell me what your challenges are, 328 - > tell me about your pain point. It's go in knowing 329 - > what that agency is trying to accomplish. Go in and 330 - > be able to ask pointed questions about their mission. How 331 - > are they doing this, how is this progressing for them? 332 - > What have they seen, what results? Where have there been 333 - > bottlenecks or where have they and talk about those types 334 - > of things with them to open the conversation because it's 335 - > all about mission enablement and their ability to link the 336 - > technical innovation that they have in terms of features, function 337 - > capabilities to benefits of driving those mission outcomes or of 338 - > enabling that agency's mission, whatever it is. And if you 339 - > do that, they're going to listen. They're going to care. 340 - >

Speaker 3: That makes a lot of sense. Is there anything else, Tony, 341 - > because I mean you're a wealth of knowledge, so you know, 342 - > is there anything that I missed that maybe you know 343 - > for a listener, what should if they take anything away 344 - > from this episode? What should it be? 345 - >

Speaker 2: The trends we're going to see after we get through 346 - > this very disruptive pace is rising pressure to innovate. They're 347 - > going to want to see real innovation and transformation, so 348 - > digital transformation to improve the services and security. They're going 349 - > to be looking to AI, more automation, secure cloud adoption 350 - > as operational imperatives, and that cloud adoption can both be 351 - > public and private. It'll be a hybrid environment. Some critical 352 - > points mean the public sector in general government must significantly 353 - > increase their IT investment. The return the ROI on it's 354 - > clear it'll drive better outcomes, it'll drive greater efficiency, it'll 355 - > reduce waste and fraud, which are all key priorities across 356 - > the board. So if we can navigate the disruption, the 357 - > budget of uncertainty, the administrative shifts, the procurement delays, Hey, 358 - > all that stuff is temporary, the long term gains will 359 - > be well worth the effort. And what I would share 360 - > is that Ingram Micro public Sector and Cisco are committed 361 - > to not only helping the agencies with this change, but 362 - > with our partners so that they can scale confidently and 363 - > delivering how comes that matter. So I probably would just 364 - > end like the future from where I sit is bright, 365 - > and you know, bold demands for investment, strong partnership and 366 - > a long term lens is what's needed right now. And 367 - > our listeners can find out more by logging on our website, 368 - > going to our exdvantage platform and visiting the public Sector 369 - > Industry Solutions page. They'll find our sales playbooks, our solutions guides, 370 - > market intelligence, contract and funding information that's out there, and 371 - > they'll have direct access to Ingram Micro Public Sector smeethe 372 - > and specialists and to our smeeeze on the Cisco solutions 373 - > as well. 374 - >

Speaker 3: Excellent, Tony, I really appreciate all the time and insight today. 375 - > Thank you so much for joining me. 376 - >

Speaker 2: Hey, Shelby, thank you so much for your questions. I 377 - > very much enjoyed our discussion. 378 - >

Speaker 3: Yeah well, thank you listeners also for tuning in and 379 - > hopefully subscribing to B to B Tech Talk with Ingram Micro. 380 - > Don't forget. You can find all these episodes on the 381 - > ingram Micro advantage platform. Until next time, I'm Shelby Skirhawk. 382 - >

Speaker 1: You've been listening to B to B tech Talk by 383 - > Ingram Micro. This episode was sponsored by Ingram Micro Exvantage. 384 - >

Speaker 2: B to B tech Talk is a. 385 - >

Speaker 1: Joint production between Sweetfish Media and Ingram Micro. To listen 386 - > to this episode and many others, visit ingrammicro dot com.