The Cube’s Dave Vellante  had an opportunity to speak with Mark Potts, HP Fellow and CTO, HP Software at this year’s HP Discover to discuss the future of Hewlett-Packard’s (HP) software business. The complete video is available after the article.

Vellante began by asking Potts what is the converged cloud. Potts explained that HP has built on the concept of converged infrastructure combining networks, server and storage and virtualizing them into a “fabric” for cloud computing. Potts went on to say, this is just one level of convergence. HP also focuses on the convergence of private, public and hybrid cloud delivery models because customers want choice in where they deploy workloads. In addition, HP offers solutions for converged management and security, which provides customers a consistent and unified experience across all delivery models.

The conversation continued with a discussion of HP’s strategy for software. Potts answered he believes HP Software is very aligned with the corporate strategy around cloud, information and security. HP has software solutions that manage hybrid cloud stacks from the infrastructure layer all the way to data and application; HP can also manage the application lifecycle. Potts continued, tools for operations management have been the traditional focus for HP’s software business, but the acquisitions of companies like Tipping Point and Fortify have allowed the focus to expand into security.

Vellante questioned how HP, which has traditionally been known as an infrastructure provider, plans to attract developers. Potts said one focus for HP is devops. The company wants to bring some of the principles from agile development into operations management. Vellante noted that analysis on Wikibon shows that many companies have never heard of devops. Potts agreed, but added that although many operations professionals aren’t familiar with the term, they have challenges that could be solved by the automation that devops provides.

The group then moved to the topic of big data. Potts said HP has a very clear strategy for the three types of data in most organizations:

• Machine data – logs, events and other operational data
• Relational data
• Unstructured data

HP has solutions for each these areas. ArcSight for log data, Vertica for relational data and Autonomy. However, the company is working to create solutions that span these tools and allows customers to have a more holistic view of information across the enterprise.