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[AUDIO LOGO] [MUSIC PLAYING] [APPLAUSE] [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: Please, welcome to the stage, Safra Catz. [MUSIC PLAYING] SAFRA CATZ: Ah, this is so fantastic. Yes, together we can do pretty much anything. And between all of you and us, this is a truly stunning moment for all of us, for technology, for people, and for doing things that, I think, many of us weren't even sure was ever going to be possible. We get to celebrate and learn from each other, and today's keynote is really focused on all of you. On teaching, and learning, and sharing, and showing what's
possible when you have the right technology and the right mindset. I think you're going to learn a lot. But before we start, I want to thank you because the thousands of you-- oh my goodness-- the thousands of you out here have given us simply the most precious thing, which is your time. And you are using that time to learn, to advance, and to share, and we're unbelievably grateful to you for that. We've really tried to reorient our entire company around you, around making you successful, and the fact that you're all here in Las Vegas with
us really means a lot to us. So thank you. Thank you for everything you do. Oh, thank you. Thank you. [APPLAUSE] Thank you. And, of course, I want to thank our partners and our sponsors for this event. I think it's an incredibly worthwhile event, and, again, sharing, learning, collaborating together. And then finally, I want to thank my employees, our team. You all have brought us here, and we are so strong together. And as you all know, it's only the beginning. So very, very exciting, and thank you to all of you. Thank you. [APPLAUSE] Thank you
all of you. You make our customers successful, and it's truly amazing, all I hear about is that. Now, today, in this keynote, we are going to talk a little bit about how companies handle change, how they see opportunities and instead of shying away from them, they embrace them. How they see challenges, and they adjust to them, and they use those things as motivation to move forward and to advance. And how they grab technology that is now available and change their entire way of operating. You're going to meet five executives all of whom are truly courageous
because they saw situations changing in their industry, or in their company, or in the markets, or even in what's possible. And they took the risk by moving to new technology and advancing even further than I think they even imagined was possible. So with that, we'll start with one of the most transformative companies that many of us ever deal with every day, and that's Uber. [APPLAUSE] [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: We all know Uber today for our rides, food, easier connectivity, and movement, but the company was originally founded in 2010 with a more singular focus-- providing access to
transportation at the touch of a button. Now, 13 years and more than 39 billion trips later, Uber is a platform that continues to solve problems around getting us closer to where we want to be, changing how people, food, and things move through cities, opening the world to new possibilities, all still at the touch of a button. Now, please, welcome Dara Khosrowshahi, CEO of Uber. [APPLAUSE] SAFRA CATZ: Thank you, Dara. Thank you. [MUSIC PLAYING] Can you imagine-- I mean, you've been CEO for? DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Six years now. SAFRA CATZ: Six years, and look at the changes
you've made. So 2024, describe the Uber of today. DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Well, the Uber of today now, we have undergone an incredible transformation since I joined, which is great. It's been a team sport. So thanks to everyone at Uber who has been a part of that transformation. But really, as we look forward now to 2024, it's all about growth for us. We operate at pretty enormous scale. We complete about 2 billion trips a quarter. So 2 billion rides to work, or delivery of food or grocery, et cetera. And to keep growing at the 20%-plus levels that
we're talking about, we have to add a billion and a half trips every single year to the platform. And that requires us to innovate and build new products, whether it's two-wheelers in Sao Paulo, or three-wheeler Ubers in New Delhi, or an Uber bus service that we're creating, you can get 20, 30 people in a single bus, reduce congestion, et cetera-- it's a service that we're building in Egypt, or grocery delivery in Santiago, all of it is new innovation and new products that we're building, or now you can use Uber to get taxis in New York,
and Rome, and Paris as well, all of the growth requires incredible innovation. It means building out new products and keeping that entrepreneurial mindset as we get from '23 to '24. SAFRA CATZ: So all that change since 2010, I mean, what were the key decisions that were made, and what led you there? DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Well, in 2010 and even when I joined the company, Uber was all about rides, right? Push a button, get a ride. We were essentially a transportation company. And for us, we decided to use the same technology ecosystem, the pricing systems that we
had, the matching, the mapping to extend transportation of people also to transportation of food and things, right? Uber Eats when I joined about six years ago was an idea, it was about 5% of the business. But now that part of the business, which is the transportation of things, is a $50-billion business all built organically. Our Uber Eats business is just as big as our Uber rides business. It has been an incredible transformation in terms of the company. COVID, while COVID decimated our mobility business, the delivery business grew at unprecedented rates, and now we are really
the go-get company. Anywhere you want to go, anything you want to get, we want to be that operating system for your everyday life. Push a button, and then good things come to you. SAFRA CATZ: I mean, what an incredible transformation. And I just wonder, I think many of the folks out here, they don't know that you sometimes get behind the car and drive around San Francisco, and deliver, and pick up. Tell me a little bit about what you learned when you were actually in the business on the front line. What'd you learn? DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Well,
I think you know, Safra, that in order to really understand a business, you've got to put yourself in the shoes of your customer, right? And anyone who comes to work at Uber comes to work because of the impact that our product is having every day, and they use our product, obviously, for going places and getting food. But what we saw is not as many of our customers use their product from a driver's perspective, right? And we've got 6 million earners on our platform now, and they are very much the customer as well. So we've been
encouraging employees, including myself, to drive and to deliver. So if any of you are in San Francisco and you get a Tesla Model Y, it might be me. Please give me five stars. I want to keep my five-star rating. SAFRA CATZ: He is a five-star driver by the way. Five stars. DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: And for me, it's been a great experience because I think you take your driver for granted, right? And when you're driving in a city, you're going through unfamiliar areas, to make sure that the rider is having the right experience, to accept the right
trips, et cetera, you really get an appreciation for what it takes to be behind the wheels. And that appreciation is incredibly important when you're building product for drivers. Our roots have always been B2C, business to consumer. We are a first-class consumer product. But when you look at the product that we're building for drivers, it really looks more like an enterprise product. It looks a B2B product. Every one of these drivers, they're their own small businesses, they run their own P&Ls. And the systems that you have to build have to be there predictably and do what
these drivers expect, and then hopefully more. SAFRA CATZ: And that's the kind of resilience that you really need when you are really the platform for their business, and it's really high standards. Consumers, I think, every once in a while, they kind of understand. But for a business, a lot of folks are involved. Now, you've had another very, very big change recently because the market's changed, and then everybody all of a sudden loved growth-- we all love growth-- but then started to talk about operating income, and profit, and all those kinds of things. Well, you've just
had your first quarter of GAAP operating income while still explosive engagement and changing the business, all doing it simultaneously. So share a little bit about how you did this modernization of your infrastructure, while also-- well, I'd say doing more spending less, many of you have heard me say before. And how did you do it? DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: 100%. So the words Uber and GAAP operating profit, they haven't belonged together historically. But they will in the future. The demands of the market are different now. And for us, really, balancing this growth and profitability has honestly been a
skill that has been a learned skill for us as an enterprise. And some of these newer innovative products that we talked about, if we build out two-wheelers, for example, in Brazil, in Brazil alone, our two-wheelers would represent the six largest countries in which we operate. The UberMoto product has grown faster than we could have ever expected. And with some of these newer products, it's impossible to predict how quickly they're going to scale, how quickly they're going to grow. So being able to modernize our back end and ecosystem and work with Oracle Cloud, for example, has
allowed us to be able to scale these products in a way that we could have never before without going through all of the trying to forecast where growth is. Essentially, Oracle Cloud is growing with us, right? And when we look at our growth this year and going to next year, 100% of our growth in compute is going to come on the Oracle Cloud, and that allows you to scale the right way, make sure that your unit economics stay predictable, stay exactly where you want to as you grow, and as a result, Oracle has been a
big, big part of our transformation to grow, but to grow profitably as well. SAFRA CATZ: Means a lot to me. As I mentioned to you earlier, for me, every time I see an Uber go by, I think to myself, we're a little bit of that, and makes me just so incredibly, incredibly proud. And listen, what you really basically did is take advantage of the economies of scale of the cloud. Where you benefit not only from your own scale, but from the scale of really many of you in this room and our entire global network. And
then when you need it, it's there, when you need less, you don't have to pay for it. I mean, that level of elasticity and economy of scale, you really can't beat that. You can never beat that alone. DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Especially during uncertain times. SAFRA CATZ: That's for sure. Especially during those. Well, there's another piece that I-- and I particularly wanted you up here because I wanted to make sure that many of you out here know about this capability because we partner with Uber in connecting our retail point of sale system directly to the platform, to
the Uber driver platform. And I think it's very important because many of you are really struggling with some very giant competitors, and you need to benefit from the economies of scale, really, of getting products to your customers cost effectively. So maybe you could share a little bit of both the vision and what's going on. DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Absolutely. So one of the businesses that we're the most excited about is Uber Direct. And essentially what we've taken is-- Uber is powered by this incredible logistics ecosystem at 6 million drivers who are carrying people, and then taking food
and/or groceries, et cetera. We have taken that logistics ecosystem, separate it from our mainline stack, and we're providing it to retailers all over the world. And it allows the corner retailer to out-Amazon Amazon, and not just offer next day delivery, but at same day on-demand delivery, which is incredibly exciting to me. 3,500 brands already use Uber Direct. Apple, for example, if you order an iPhone, you can get it delivered that same day. We want that same delight to come to every single local retailer. And what's incredibly exciting about this initiative is the local retailer who's
powered by Oracle retail systems now can plug into Uber Direct to offer on-demand delivery, and even on-demand returns. If something doesn't work out, we can have a courier come and pick up your returns, take it back to the store, all of it is powered through Oracle technology and Uber technology and logistics. It's one of our most exciting new initiatives. SAFRA CATZ: It's so exciting for us because we grow with you. And so what we've covered, growing in uncertain times, profitably, and expanding into all new markets using technology. I mean, how exciting is this? For all
of you, Uber Direct is being highlighted in the hub because I know many of you are really trying to solve exactly these problems. And I'm so thrilled to be partnering with you. Thank you. Thank you for working with us. My technical teams love your teams. And I feel like sometimes-- and I got this from one of your folks one time, they can't tell where we end and you start. And that is a real-- that's the joy for us, so thank you. DARA KHOSROWSHAHI: Thank you very much for having me. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you. [APPLAUSE] Just
so inspiring. Imagine growing 20% profitably, and really dealing and expanding worldwide. For us they're a spectacular global partner, and a wonderful customer, and a true test of the capabilities of our cloud. Next, I'm excited to hear from Aon about automating sales, marketing, and service, while bringing all that data together focusing on customer success. Aon. [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: As a global professional services firm that provides a wide range of risk advisory solutions, Aon is on a mission to equip and empower business leaders all over the world. Aon provides clients in over 120 countries with insights and
tools to feel confident in making decisions that ultimately protect their business and enable sustainable growth. Please, welcome to the stage, Lori Goltermann, Chief Client Officer, CEO for Enterprise Clients for Aon. [APPLAUSE] SAFRA CATZ: Thank you, Lori. Thank you for being here, and for sharing. Of course, we're both basically obsessed with customer success. So you are not only the Chief Client Officer, though, I feel like I am, too, sometimes, you're CEO of the Enterprise Clients. Again, incredible work. You're so focused on putting the customer at the center. Can you share with everyone else here about what
that approach means for you all? And I think they're going to learn a few things there, too. LORI GOLTERMANN: Thank you so much, Safra. I love the theme of CloudWorld client success. When I listen to the Uber story, we don't feel successful unless we're helping companies like Uber be successful. And our strategy is really centered around three things, building customer intimacy and the relationships, bringing them relevance and thought leadership to help them make decisions, and then driving impact at the end of the day. So we are so pleased to work with Oracle CX. You are
empowering our end-to-end client strategy. And when I think about the relationship as we've all come out of COVID, the amount of stakeholders we really need to partner with from the head of ESG, the head of supply chain, CHROs, the world is so complicated today that we've really got to dig deep into understanding our clients at a level I've never seen before. And then the relevance that we bring them is structured around risk capital, which is our reinsurance and commercial risk business, where we're doing everything to protect the balance sheet of companies to our human capital,
which is really end-to-end talent. And the three big themes we talk about there are, how do you reshape your employee mix to meet your strategy? How do you reskill? That's a big one. And then how do you reimagine total rewards, whether it's where you want to work, or how you want to have a health and wellbeing strategy or save for retirement, and all of these things are empowered by moving 20,000 people of our firm into our Aon business services that is the engine that powers all the operations. So Oracle CX gives us that end-to-end strategy,
and we are delighted with how we can serve customers today. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you so much. Thank you for sharing. But to get to where you are today, you actually started with what a lot of people know of, all those silos of data everywhere, how did you really integrate it, and how did you even decide to have the courage to undergo such a project? LORI GOLTERMANN: Well, we've always been such a client-centric firm. But when you think about-- I've been at Aon for 30 years, and the amount of acquisitions and capabilities that we required, and
everybody had their own special system that they said, we can't change it. We have to stay exactly as we are. And we were left with 30 regional and local CRM systems, six different global platforms. And when you wanted to serve your client as a global team, it was really challenging to do that. So we consolidated all of those platforms and all of that data into Oracle CX. It was a heavy lift. There was a lot of change management, but now we can actually serve our clients with every day immediate action around what are their highest
and most complex needs that we can serve. And we never could have done that before. We'll soon come out with our global risk management survey, and we're talking about mapping all the relationships we have around the world, Brazil, India, Asia, Europe. And when that survey comes out, we'll be able to sit down immediately and help clients think through everything from, how will you address your supply chain? How will you meet your net zero targets? If these were your priorities, what maybe can you learn from your industry peers? And what are the things in your strategy
that are missing that we need to spend time on? You mentioned time in your opening. I think this is where time is so valuable. We have to make sure that we're building all of our strategies in the areas that matter, and by having our Oracle CX platform and our attention on our clients, it's possible today in a way it never has been before. SAFRA CATZ: And it's funny, as you're talking, I'm sort of going down my own memory lane of how hard it is to bring systems together. And in many ways, it's not the technology
that's hard, it's the people who say, I've got to keep what I'm using. And all of that is so much a piece of it, and the change management. But you've now gone and automated sales, marketing, service. So where does this lead you moving forward? I mean, how does this impact your focus and opportunities that are now valuable that wouldn't have been able to do before? LORI GOLTERMANN: Yeah. I love the question. When we think about sales and marketing, today we're really thinking about the big categories of the conversations clients want to have. So that could
be in workforce optimization and resilience. How do we make sure we're all ready to get through the challenges of today? It could be in digital transformation, which is what everyone in this room as an expert is certainly focused on. So we have built a data analytics service platform and housed all of our internal and external sources of data that our colleagues and consultants can now deliver on what we call one end of the spectrum, which is the brilliant basics, all the way through to the more complex consulting. And the brilliant basics, listening to Uber before,
you've got to have proof of auto insurance or nothing moves. You've got to have proof that you have coverage when you have a loss. So by having this one platform, we can really deliver on the basics in our service, but then we can also do the more complex. 1% of employees drive 40% of the medical cost in most companies. These are your high-risk claimants. So we're using predictive analytics to help people see how to avoid diabetes, cancer, and work with your primary care physicians, and really building out that holistic wellbeing strategy. And so building a
global strategy that's executed locally is something we can do now with the wonderful Oracle CX and the way we're thinking about harnessing all the data and analytics together. SAFRA CATZ: Well, you've done the hard work in many ways, now you've got all your data. So, of course, many of the folks out here in the audience have come to CloudWorld this year to hear about AI. And, of course, to have the foundation, you've got to have the data. So maybe you could share a little bit about the vision for the future for using AI for-- really,
to run the business and have better opportunities and outcomes. LORI GOLTERMANN: AI will be one of the biggest topics here and in the future for quite some time, and the Oracle's wonderful leadership, I know we'll all leave this conference more educated than we came. And AI for us really starts with industry. When we're sitting down with a financial institution talking about customer satisfaction, fraud protection, that's very, very different than a life sciences company who's literally using artificial intelligence to cure cancer, to take research and development all the way to medicine on the shelves and better
outcomes. So we're helping them really think through how to build the skills and the staff that they need. Our data would say only 35% of companies feel they have the right skills to meet their strategy, and on AI, it's less than 5%. So while we're really helping the fast-paced discussions, we're also really thinking through the risk mitigation strategies. We've got to protect the data, the privacy, the intellectual property. I think this is an early days journey, but moving fast but thoughtfully, I would say, is the message around AI. And for Aon, it's going to make
us wildly more efficient on the brilliant basics. We know it's going to help us with the insane amount of calculations we do every day with our actuaries, what would take weeks now takes seconds, and we know it's going to unlock innovation. So we're thrilled to be part of the AI conversation with leading firms like Oracle, and I know I have a lot to learn from all of you technology experts out here with AI. SAFRA CATZ: Well, thank you so much. For us, it's exciting to see a company hyperfocused on the customer, on better outcomes, all
by building the platform first to bring it all together, and that puts you in the perfect position to use the newest technologies moving forward. LORI GOLTERMANN: Thank you, Safra. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you so much, Lori. Thank you. LORI GOLTERMANN: Pleasure. Thank you. [APPLAUSE] [MUSIC PLAYING] SAFRA CATZ: So this next customer I think many of you wouldn't have necessarily thought I would invite. And you will actually hear a story that I think is really pretty interesting because the way we focused Oracle is to focus on what is best for our customers. And in this case, it's
an SAP, enormous database, that has moved to OCI. And I want to share with you Loblaw Companies. [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: Since 1919, Loblaw has innovated the grocery retail experience to better serve Canadians. It is Canada's food and pharmacy leader as well as its largest retailer and private sector employer. With approximately 2 billion transactions each year in its unmatched network of nearly 2,500 stores and national e-commerce options, Loblaw brings food, pharmacy, beauty, apparel, and financial services to customers through many of Canada's favorite and most trusted brands. The company's loyalty program, PC Optimum, has nearly 16 million
active members, and is one of Canada's largest and most loved reward programs. Loblaw's purpose is to help Canadians live life well. It makes good food affordable, health, beauty, and wellness accessible, savings for the future possible, and essential style achievable. Please, welcome to the stage, David Markwell, Chief Technology and Analytics Officer of Loblaw Companies. [APPLAUSE] SAFRA CATZ: So, David, the video showed a little bit about Loblaws, but it's actually much broader and really mission-focused. Maybe you could share with the audience because we have lots of retailers, we've got banks, we've got people who do parts of
what you do, but share the whole mission for the company and dig a little deeper than the video. DAVID MARKWELL: Sure. Thanks, Safra. And first of all, thanks for having me. I'm super excited to be here and to share our purpose and our business with all of you. So at the heart of what we do is our purpose of helping Canadians live life well. And we do that through a set of different strategic focus areas, such as retail, pharmacy, financial services, and more. At the core of our operations, though, we are a retailer, and we
do that through many different formats. We have conventional grocery stores, discount stores, superstores, apparel, pharmacy, beauty boutiques, and that gives Canadians access to the products they need in a way that's convenient and affordable. Through our Shoppers Drug Mart pharmacies, we offer not only prescription and services from that perspective, but we also offer enhanced medical services and additional health services and consults as we expand the scope of practice in health care. And through our President's Choice financial services, we give Canadians access to credit cards, savings accounts, all that support what they do from a financial service
perspective every day. But where the real power lies is that we bring all this together for the purpose of helping our customers through our PC Optimum loyalty program, where customers can earn and redeem points for value across our entire network, whether that's our digital or bricks and mortar footprint and all those formats that we described. But what really makes me excited is our focus, not just on the products and services we offer, but how we operate. And we've made commitments to reduce food waste from our stores, to eliminate nonrecyclable plastics from our operations and supply
chain, and to achieve a net zero carbon footprint, all with the purpose of helping Canadians. SAFRA CATZ: It's really a spectacular mission and accomplishing it so well. And I think we get a little bit of insight in how you all think and work because of, I'd say, the risks you're willing to take, the new things you're willing to do. I mean, listen, a lot of people still-- not so many out here-- but still feel like moving to the cloud is less secure than on-premise, and yet you run one of the largest SAP databases, about 180
terabytes. And you successfully brought it to the Oracle Cloud, but how did you make that decision, and how is it going? DAVID MARKWELL: Sure. You embarrassed me because you said it was enormous or something. So it was like, it is a very large database. SAFRA CATZ: It is. It is DAVID MARKWELL: Sometimes embarrassingly so. So we've been on our cloud journey for almost six years now. I made a commitment to the organization six years ago that we would run all our applications in the cloud as we became a much more customer-focused and agile business. Obviously,
moving something of that size, an SAP runs our entire business, all the formats I described earlier. It's the heart of everything that we do, so it wasn't without risk. We ran a very rigorous selection process. I had a few criteria that had to be met. The first were really around making sure that we had a platform in the cloud that was performant enough and cost effective enough to run at the profile we needed it to. We also needed to be able to mitigate operational and migration risk, right? Because it doesn't come without risk to move
something of that size in a very short time window. We moved it over six hours. That was our actual downtime. And then, really, also what I was looking for was a partner who was in it with us, and who felt as much a part of our success as we did. And so as I went through all those criteria, and there were many applicants for the role, Oracle came out on top, both from a partnership perspective as well as meeting all the technical and performance requirements. And so we've been running there for over six months, and
we've certainly achieved everything we'd hoped to from, both a performance perspective, our critical workloads run much, much faster and we've seen a meaningful improvement in batch and transactions that's unlocked a number of capabilities for our business. And going back to your first question about security, we also use the opportunity of the migration to increase our security posture from an SAP perspective to automate all our maintenance routines, and overall increase the resiliency of the platform, and all those things help me sleep better at night. And I just really wanted to show my appreciation for Safra because
before the migration, I'd asked her for a meeting, and could she personally guarantee it would work? And she's like, text this number. And so I did. It was her number, it turns out. And she replied back, and you reached out the night of the cut over, the morning, and then through the hypercare over the next couple of weeks to make sure that I knew and that the leadership of Loblaw knew that Oracle was right there with us. And I certainly appreciated that. SAFRA CATZ: I have to say, we were as happy as you were with
the outcome. It was truly a partnership, again, with you. And in a way, it also-- it melds very, very well with where our hearts are because both of us are very focused on transforming the health care ecosystem. I know many of you have heard us talk about this, but maybe you could share a bit of the vision and the opportunity, the crossover between health care and technology and how automation will really change that. DAVID MARKWELL: Sure. It's a great question. And in Canada, I'm sure, like most parts of the world, Canadians suffer with access to
not just health care but health information. And so we've made it a part of our purpose to leverage our vast network to help deliver health care services to Canadians, and to make health care information more accessible. And while we do that, Canadians trust us with their data and want to make sure that it's secure, that it's accessible, and that our experiences are personalized to them. And so we have a number of health outcomes or health journeys that we've enabled around medical adherence, where we can ensure or that patients stay compliant to their medication through reminders
and through specialized care. For chronic patients, we have personalized messaging that goes out to them to help them stay on their programs. And then we have our PC Health app, which allows customers to link their biometric information, blood pressure readings, diet, health care, prescriptions all into one app that allows them, along with care journeys and other wellness programs, to help them really manage their health care. And this is really part of our strategic imperative around our connected health care ecosystem as we really try and help move the health care situation along in Canada. SAFRA CATZ:
Yeah. I mean, thank you, David, for sharing because what it shows is that as you move to a very performant, cost-effective foundation, you can then expand into new areas that are critical, really, for the success of the business, and for your country, which is amazing. So thank you. DAVID MARKWELL: Yeah. Thank you. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for everything. [APPLAUSE] It is really inspiring to hear about what our customers are doing. Our next customer is actually TIM Brasil, and they decided to move, not a little of their business, not half
of their business, but all their operations to the cloud, and you're going to hear about that next. [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: TIM Brasil is a telecommunications company that serves Brazil under the mission, to evolve together with courage and transform technology into freedom. The company is recognized for leading important market movements since the beginning of its operations, and standing at the forefront of digital transformation in Brazil, helping enable innovation in agribusiness and other impactful initiatives. TIM remains a leader in 4G coverage in Brazil, and a pioneer in 5G activation networks. Welcoming to the stage, Leonardo Capdeville, Chief
Technology Information Officer for TIM Brasil. [APPLAUSE] SAFRA CATZ: Thank you. Thank you, everyone. OK. I'm not going to let it go even one second. So all right. You're on-premise, and you decide, we're moving everything, not a little, not half like I told them, everything to the cloud. You have to share with everyone how you did that because you were the first communications company in the world, and you've got 60-what, 62 million customers, and, boom, move the entire thing to the cloud. You've got to tell this story. LEONARDO CAPDEVILLE: Thank you. Thank you. We are very
honored about this history because we have to remember that when we take this decision was in 2020. We were in the early stages of the COVID pandemic. So imagine all the uncertainty that we had at that time. But at the same time, we look ahead, and we see that the next three years will be the most critical and transformational for our history as a company because we were finalizing one M&A discussion to consolidate the market in Brazil, acquiring a new company with a lot of assets, spectrum, towers, including 60 million customers. After that, we were
discussing about the 5G action. What it means is a lot of opportunity, but some kind of obligations. And a look in data, we see that we need a very, very strong balance sheet to do all this investment. So we have a very interesting statement as our propose that is, evolve with courage, transforming technology into freedom, so we decided to move on. And when you look at the results after these three years, it was fantastic. For example, for the M&A, after to be approved, in just one year, we integrated both company, all the assets, including migrating
all these 16 million subscribers just one year, imagine that. Without all the facility that we have in the cloud, it will be impossible. Secondly, we were the first company to launch the 5G standalone in Brazil, and until now we are the leader in this technology. Again, without all the capacity that we have in the cloud environment, it will be impossible. The third is about the financial constraint. When we started the move to cloud, we expected some benefits, but in the end, we have ahead of that. We reduce our TCO in IT infrastructure in more than
30%. 30%, yes, it was fantastic. But last and not least, we improved the performance on the main systems. So, for example, in CRM that is Siebel-based, we reduced the answer time in more than 50%. We improved our billing performance, and improving our SAP performance too. So it was fantastic. It was good to have this kind of courage on that time. SAFRA CATZ: I mean, incredible. Think about it. It's COVID, you've got 5G rolling, you've got acquisitions and all sorts of things going on simultaneously, you move everything to the cloud, and you have a TCO improvement
of 30%, which we would all kill for, and ultimately, better performance so you serve your customers better. I mean, truly, truly incredible. And yet, tell a little bit about some of the strategies and some of the challenges of securing so much personal data and all sorts of data. LEONARDO CAPDEVILLE: Yeah. So you said well. We were the first to do that, so we have to learn with ourself. So when we started this movement, I guess that the planning was the key, no. So we worked together with our providers, and since the beginning, we involved some
kind of a special stakeholders like cybersecurity, legal team, compliance to guarantee that all the risks was evaluated and mitigated. The most important and challenging was to change the mindset of our team. The mindset is the key point. And what we show is that, OK, guys, we know that now we are operating our own data center, but we will move ahead, and we will manage a ecosystem on cloud-based. Imagine all the opportunity that we have there. So I guess that this was what moved the team for this new kind of skill. SAFRA CATZ: I mean, you
think about it, this was really courageous. But what you said was, again, what I've always believed, it's about the mindset. It's about the courage. It's about the leadership because you really wouldn't be where you are now if you hadn't done it. You wouldn't have the capacity. You wouldn't be able to move forward the way you're doing it. And it really is a testament to your team, and it's also, of course, been a joy working with you all. And you also leveraged one of our newest and closest partners Microsoft. And the work we were doing-- again,
we feel like everything's changed at Oracle because now, again, focusing on what you need, we realize bringing Microsoft in working closely with us is going to meet your needs. Maybe you could share your thoughts about how that whole partnership has worked and what it meant to you guys. LEONARDO CAPDEVILLE: Sure. It was a surprise. I should say a gift. Because at the beginning, when we were evaluated about the cloud providers, each one has their own capacity and speciality. So, for example, when you look at our CRM, it's Siebel-based. When you look our other system, it
was based on Windows OS. Some systems was more database-oriented, other was frontend. So how to build the best of that. When we received the answer confirming that Microsoft and Oracle was together, it was like, wow, now we can choose the best of each technology and to apply that in our system. So it was amazing, it was amazing. And one important thing here-- and I'd like to make a special thanks for the Oracle team Brazil that is lead by Luiz Meisler-- is that Oracle was focused, beyond the technology, on the customer needs. And it's what's make
the difference totally. Yeah. I appreciate that so much, and thanks for your effort to do that. We were the first case in the region, so we are very proud about that, sure. SAFRA CATZ: And we are so proud to be part of it. And in a moment, I'm going to show you something Luiz Meisler actually sent me when you all were done. So everyone will see how much it was pride for us, too. And finally, I guess I get to ask you, now that the cloud transition is really well on your way, talk a little
bit about the new opportunities that open up in front of you because you've got this unbelievably performant and cost-effective platform. LEONARDO CAPDEVILLE: Well, I guess that the move to cloud was the first step. Again, talking about freedom. Now we don't have more to have the concern about the data center facilities, the hardware obsolescence, the connectivity, and we can be very focused to move our organization to a data-driven organization, and to you use the best of the AI. With that, we can move ahead and to deliver the best service and products for our customers and for
our company. So we really believe that we are prepared now to move and to make this leapfrog for a new kind of organization in a new environment. SAFRA CATZ: It's exactly, again, the goal. Benefiting from our economies of scale gives you that elasticity and availability that you need to expand. I mean, this is the perfect partnership. But I do want to share with you and with all of you what Luiz sent. I hope they've got a picture. I have it on my phone. That, by the way, is what your empty data center, one of them,
look like. And I can tell you that seeing that, we-- I know how proud you are, but I feel like we are so proud, too. So thank you. Thank you for letting us be part of it. It's really amazing, and thank you for the courage. LEONARDO CAPDEVILLE: Thank you very much. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you so much. [APPLAUSE] Thank you. [MUSIC PLAYING] Now, our next customer is one that many of you know we've worked with for years. They are over a hundred years old, can you imagine? And yet, most recently, they have truly transformed themselves into
a global automation company. So with that, Emerson. [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: Emerson was originally founded in 1890 as a manufacturer of electric motors and fans out of Saint Louis, Missouri. Over the past 100-plus years, the company has grown from a regional manufacturer into a global technology solutions powerhouse, providing innovative solutions for the world's essential industries. Through its leading automation portfolio, Emerson helps manufacturers optimize operations, protect personnel, reduce emissions, and achieve sustainability goals. Join us in welcoming to the stage, Ram Krishnan, Executive Vice President and COO of Emerson. SAFRA CATZ: Hey, Ram. RAM KRISHNAN: Thank you. SAFRA
CATZ: Great. That's great. Thank you for joining us. [MUSIC PLAYING] Wow, you're going to walk this group through quite a lot of changes in a minute. But before we do that, talk a little bit about how you really handle the global scale by being consistently high quality, and yet also meet the local needs, and how you organized yourselves to be able to be both local and global at the same time. RAM KRISHNAN: First off, Safra, thank you for the opportunity. It's great to be here, and a great honor to talk about this partnership. Just a
little bit about Emerson. As you know, we're an industrial technology company, and we provide and deliver mission-critical automation solutions to a variety of essential industries, energy, chemical, power. In fact, 50% of the power generated in the United States is on Emerson control systems. The top 25 pharmaceutical companies use Emerson automation systems and now semiconductors. So a lot of very important essential industries. And we run a very global business. Operate in 80-plus countries, 130 factories, and 14,000 suppliers, and given that complexity and what our customers expect, which is speed and resilience as it relates to how
we take care of them. So it was very important for us to architect a manufacturing strategy, which was a global franchise approach to how we deliver our capabilities to our customers built on a digital footprint, which is our Betsy Oracle EBS single instance. Which has been a journey, but a very, very important differentiator for us because it gives us the cost position, and the resilience, and the global scale to help our customers meet their-- help us meet our customers' expectations. Now, we augment that with regional production capability and regional supply chains for the necessary speed.
And this formula where we have a standardized approach to our global manufacturing, order to cash, procure to pay, manufacturing, supply chain across our disparate product lines on that single instance but have fast regional production where we manufacture in the region for the region has really been a competitive advantage. And it's withstood the test of time, particularly during the COVID pandemic, where we were able to deliver to our customers with this franchised approach. And Oracle has been a great partner in this journey. Kudos to the Oracle team for the support. And we're not done. We have
an opportunity to make that OCI migration that we're working very hard on and get more applications on the Fusion Cloud, which is very exciting. SAFRA CATZ: Yeah. We're so thrilled. Some of you probably know I've been the executive sponsor for Emerson for decades. And so we have our own little Emerson Oracle statements, but I don't want them to feel bad, so I won't mention it. I will tell you that some of the folks in the audience probably don't know that you started, actually, as an engineer in the factories. And I wonder how-- you were hearing
Dara driving around in Ubers. I'm wondering how this changed your thinking and impacts the decisions you make as chief operating officer. RAM KRISHNAN: Yeah. You're spot on. I've been with Emerson for 30 years now, and I started as an engineer. Worked across almost every business within the company, 11 different roles. Lived in Asia, in the Middle East, many parts of the US, and worked in all of our factory operations. And one thing it's taught me operating in the factory environment is truly the bias for action. I think it's a very, very important attribute for us
in operations. And the other element that has really influenced me over the last 30 years is the role of technology in how it has helped deliver on that speed and resiliency I talked about with that bias for action. So as an operating officer, my role in the company as is every operating officer's role is to convert that vision into results with a bias for action. And one of the terms that I use with my team is vision without execution is hallucination. So I think it's very important that that learning that I've had, and we've all
had, and applying technology to drive action in an operating environment is truly a competitive advantage. SAFRA CATZ: It's funny, Leonardo talked about mindset, you're talking about bias for action, leadership, we were talking about courage. I mean, you're starting to hear a theme about how important it is not to just think about it, but to actually move forward and change, especially in times like this when the markets change, the industries change, things are pretty much changing around us, really, just while we sit here. And hearing Emerson talk about change, you have to share with this group
the way the company has literally completely transformed into this cohesive automation company within just a couple of years. Truly incredible. RAM KRISHNAN: Absolutely. An exciting, really exciting last 24 months. And the transformation of this 130-plus-year-old company to what is now a cohesive automation company exposed to secular tailwinds like digital transformation, and sustainability, certainly energy security, which is meaningful to most countries we operate. And then the reshoring that's happening, none of that can happen without automation. So we were excited about the growth prospects and how we can become very, very relevant to our customers with a
world class technology platform, which has all of the sensors, controls, and level three optimization software to help our customers in the journey. And what is most important to our customers today is what I define as the dual challenge. Every one of our customers is looking to unlock more capacity and more production, while balancing their aspirations to run their operations more sustainably. Automation and that complete tech stack has a very, very important role to play. So we sensed that opportunity, and we repositioned the company to be a pure play automation company. We did $18 billion, or
deployed $18 billion of capital to bring the right assets into the fold, primarily software, and we divested $18 billion of the company to where we sit today. And what's most exciting about this for us is while we've helped our customers drive the vision of going from an analog process control plan to what is a digitally connected plant today, frankly, the future is even more exciting where we now have the opportunity with the technology capability to help our customers move from a digitally connected plant to what is a self-optimizing or an autonomous plant with a software-defined
automation strategy that links the intelligence in the field to sensors, to control at the edge, to applications on the cloud that can deliver the type of performance customers are looking for. And we as an automation company are uniquely positioned to help our customers do that. SAFRA CATZ: Yeah. I mean, it's automation, it's autonomous, it's artificial intelligence. And, in fact, we're partnering with you on the factories of the future. Maybe you could share a little bit about, really, the endeavor from your perspective, and some of the technologies that we're going to bring to bear in bringing
modern technology, including AI into the factory floor, that last place it arrives in many cases. RAM KRISHNAN: Spot on. For an operator, the most exciting times for us are just ahead of us. And the next frontier and frankly the final frontier is the digital transformation of our factories. As you know, our bespoke operations, there's a lot of complexity there, but technology has evolved where the digital transformation of the factory is going to unlock productivity, drive uptime and reliability of the assets in the factory, drive top quartile safety performance, while delivering the sustainability results and outcomes
that we're looking for. So we're very excited about the role of technology. The other important factor here where this partnership is really important to us is factories generate a lot of data. The assets in a factory are instrumented. There's a lot of sensors that generate data. The control at the edge, the PLCs that drive the assembly lines generate a lot of data. And we believe that a cohesive software platform with applications running on the cloud that can harness that data into actionable insights can unlock a lot of value in our factories. That's what we've done
in the office, now that translates to the factory. And Oracle as a journey partner for us is in a unique position to bridge what we're doing and what we define as the OT environment to what has already happened in the IT space. So very exciting. It is a final frontier for us. And it is a journey, but one we're very excited about. SAFRA CATZ: It is so exciting. And for me, all these years working with Emerson, it is like, once again, a new Emerson. And companies like ours who have been around a while, you know
the way to survive is that bias for action, that moving forward. So thank you. Thank you for sharing with all of us. RAM KRISHNAN: Thank you. Thank you for your support. Appreciate it. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you. Amazing. Thank you so much. [APPLAUSE] [MUSIC PLAYING] Ah, this is so much fun. And we're almost at the end, though, because I'm going to top this group up with First Solar, who, imagine this, they took 26 systems of our competitors, SAP, Workday, Salesforce, and they went ahead and rolled it all into Oracle Fusion applications. But what I want you
to hear is why, and how, and what's been possible because of that. So First Solar next. [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER: First solar is a solar technology company with a mission, to advance the fight against climate change. From sourcing, to manufacturing, to module recycling, First Solar's technology embodies sustainability and responsibility towards people and the planet with products that are solar designed, built, and delivered responsibly. Welcoming to the stage, Aaron Bly, CIO of First Solar. [MUSIC PLAYING] SAFRA CATZ: I love this. Just a hey, Aaron. Wait till you hear about this guy. So all right. First of all,
you're going to need to set the stage because First Solar is not like all the others, there's a lot of things that are different. So talk a little bit about the industry, what happened, what's been going on, and how you're different so that folks really understand how special this is. AARON BLY: Yeah. So first off, thanks for having us. This is great. It's great to see everybody out here. Yeah. Solars have been on a unique journey. 20 years ago, it was all about who wanted to be-- feel green and really take advantage of it. Well,
now it's different. Solar is now the lowest cost energy option pretty much everywhere in the world. So great time to be in the industry for sure. Our business model is based on differentiation, and I'll give you a couple examples of what makes First Solar unique in this space. First is our technology. Most of the industry is based on silicon. We actually use a semiconductor that, really, over the life of a solar panel, you get more energy. So that's an advantage we have. The second thing is our manufacturing process. The whole industry is pretty much based
on batch processing. Ours is seamless. So under one roof, you put a piece of glass in, about four and a half hours later, you have a solar panel ready to ship to our customers. The third thing is our supply chain. Wherever we are building factories, we're building them close to where the demand is at, and we are leveraging domestic supply chain. So not only gets us more supply close to our plants, but it also adds several thousands local jobs, which is pretty awesome. And the fourth thing is we have a history of basing our company
on sustainability, and we call it responsible solar. So we have the lowest carbon footprint, lowest in pretty much every other metric. But we really take that to heart. It doesn't make a sense to produce a solar panel that takes years to offset the energy it took to produce. In our case, it's two months payback. So that's pretty cool. And then one other thing I'd just like to highlight is cadmium tellurides are made in secret sauce-type concept. I guess it's not secret anymore, I just let it out of the bag. But with that semiconductor, we can
actually recycle our solar panel. And we've been doing this for years, but you can recycle about 90% of that panel and reuse it. And that cadmium telluride can actually be used 41 times. So you're actually getting energy out of that one element for over a thousand years. SAFRA CATZ: I mean, these are just incredible. And it's so important because you meet your mission goals, but also are able to run a business. I mean, four or five years ago, the company really was at a serious inflection, and you really had to make changes and decide how
you were going to run this business. I mean, maybe you could share with the folks out here because so many of them are going through industry changing issues, and they've got to make some bold moves. AARON BLY: Yeah. Actually, it started back in 2017. We had a smaller footprint of our solar panel, and the rest of the industry was really getting to bigger panels. And so we took the plunge, and we basically shut down all of our plants, ripped out all the equipment, put brand new equipment in, and now we have a really big solar
panel that's unique in the industry as well. And so that took a lot of courage. So part of that is we also looked at, what are we really good at? We're good at technology. We're good at manufacturing. We were in other business units over the course of the life of the solar industry. We were in development. We were in construction. We were in operation maintenance. Now there's a lot more companies that do that, that's not really a differentiator, so we got out of those businesses. And so what that meant on the back end, we had
brand new plants, we had to divest the businesses off of, and we were left with a lot of technology debt. And so we looked around and said, what should we do? Let's consolidate our systems, and that's where we're at here. SAFRA CATZ: Well, it's interesting. So, again, courage, change, mindset, just willing to pretty much change everything and figure out what's differentiating about you and how to move forward. And you've got to share with the audience, with all the pieces, how you actually decided to consolidate it, and what you were looking for in a partner. Because
some of the things you were using, pretty famous, and takes quite a lot to go, nah, I'm going to go do this. So you got to tell these guys. AARON BLY: Yeah. So part of the journey was, as we were in these different business units, we, of course, as those businesses, came up really quickly. We were going out and buying the flashiest thing out there, following the candy. And so part of this was when we got to the point where-- we needed to consolidate. We had to do that on the back end of the business.
But what we want to do is we want to focus, really, our energies on what we do best, that's manufacturing, that's technology. We didn't want to try to be-- spend the money and our time trying to be the best at all these other business processes. And so we went through-- our last part of our transformation was called MVP, minimal viable process. And so we first wanted to find a platform that pretty much could cover all of our end-to-end processes. So Oracle checked the box on that. The next thing was we really wanted to-- I wanted
to get the stuff out of the data center and have somebody that's doing it all the time deal with it. And so we wanted to go to the cloud, and so that was the second part. So with all that, we wanted, also-- it was very important for me and the company to have a partner that we could trust. I mean, I'm not just saying this because I'm talking to you, but Oracle listened. They helped. They advised. And so along that way, it was very valuable. We were a part of the Lighthouse program. That program was
a big reason why we got to the point where we're at now. And I'm happy to say, on the ERP side, we actually went live 48 days ago. SAFRA CATZ: And it's fantastic. I mean, again, these kinds-- you have so much going on in your industry, how much time do you want to spend on your accounting? I mean, these aren't why people pick your products. And it's you want to do all of that. I love that MVP. I call that often vanilla. Some of you have heard me talk, let's keep it simple. Let's do that
part. Let's do it quickly. It's one of the reasons we get to announce earnings anywhere from eight to sometimes 11 days after the quarter's closed, if there's a weekend, because we keep it simple even in a huge global operation like ours. So I love to see it when companies like yours really follow and partner with us. I'd like to dig in on HR for a minute. Because that's an area where there's a lot of people talking because we all care so much about our employees, and our mission, and keeping them, retaining them, and training them,
the whole experience. Maybe you could share a little bit about that. AARON BLY: Sure. So we actually went live with HCM almost two years ago. And I've been really impressed with the platform, from everything from hire to retire, we actually have safety in there, too. We do a tremendous amount of things with safety and really pleased with that. But the thing that we got the most value out of it as an associate or as a manager, everything's pretty much-- I'm the center of attention in HCM. It's all based on what me as an individual needs
to do, or me as a manager needs to do with my staff. And so it really allows me to see everything. It's just really simple. And I don't have to go to a training class, it's pretty intuitive. And so that's been a very powerful platform for us. And we're really-- I was in the HCM CAB yesterday, and some of the things we're doing, we're a little further ahead than a lot of companies, and the platform really allows us to do that. And so just can't say enough about that. SAFRA CATZ: That is so nice to
hear. Of course, we use it ourselves, so I'm able to do approvals on my phone. So no, I'm not just watching some video, I'm actually approving your HR req. So that's my story, and I'm sticking with it. But I will say that you don't actually think you're going to get out of this stage without talking a little bit about AI. Because this whole area, this whole area you are focused on, I mean, artificial intelligence can truly change the industry. And folks came to CloudWorld to learn about that, and maybe you could share a little bit
about how it's going to change for you. AARON BLY: Yeah, sure. So we honestly believe that we have some of the most leanest, competitive manufacturing processes in the world. And so we are always looking at cutting-edge. And AI is cutting-edge. We've been using it in our manufacturing processes for the last couple of years. First, just starting to get-- testing it and see what it would do, and we've gotten some fantastic results. I'm actually really looking forward to this week, learning how Oracle's going to roll out AI through all the platforms, and how I get to
take advantage of it. SAFRA CATZ: Yeah. We are so thrilled. I've got to tell you, we have waited for this moment where the data, and the compute, and the GPUs, and all the technology come together. And I would say, as I said at the beginning, this is probably the single most exciting period in technology in decades. And it's going to be an exciting, exciting time. And partnering with you all is just a pleasure. So thank you. Thank you so much. AARON BLY: Yeah. Thank you. SAFRA CATZ: Thank you. AARON BLY: Yeah. [APPLAUSE] SAFRA CATZ: Well,
I cannot thank enough our customer speakers. I hope that as you were hearing them, you heard bits and advice that you can bring back with you. And if I could just underline, aside from the technology-- which, of course, you will hear about all this week, and, in fact, with Larry Ellison this afternoon as he really shows the overarching strategy and vision for our future, and you will hear from Clay Magouyrk, and Steve Miranda, and Juan Loaiza about all of our capabilities-- I want you to remember one thing out of today, at least, out of this.
That it is ultimately about making our customers successful, and making all the different individuals-- giving them and sharing that courage and leadership to have that mindset for action, I think, that you heard, and having the attitude to really use the newest technologies because this is a very, very important time, and things are changing around us, and we want to help you move ahead. So thank you very much. Thanks for being with us today, and come back to see Larry. Thank you. [APPLAUSE]
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