As IT sprawl looms, some companies are tightening bonds within their ecosystems with the goal of helping customers reign it all in. Multi-cloud and inter-cloud environments are trending, and they require concerted efforts by multiple players to perform complex tasks. This growing body of partners and vendors will require customer feedback for crucial intelligence on how their collaborations are panning out on the ground.

Robin Matlock, chief marketing officer at VMware, Inc., spoke to John Furrier (@furrier), host of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, during VMworld 2016 about VMware’s ecosystem 2.0 — the growing network of companies and individuals needed to orchestrate success.

Matlock is in the spotlight for this week’s theCUBE Women in Tech feature.

“First of all, there’s emerging technologies, there’s service providers, there’s SISOS [Software-Intensive System of Systems], there’s the telcos, there’s ISVs [Independent Software Vendors], there’s the SaaS [Software as a Service] providers, there’s the two-tier distribution, the channel partners, the people who touch the customers, there’s the customers, there’s the consultants — I think it’s just all evolving with us in one big tornado,” Matlock explained. “And how about containers? That’s a whole other dimension, right?”

Meet the new boss

Matlock emphasized that customer feedback is paramount in customizing the ecosystem.

“We really value an ecosystem. Our customers want and expect that we work with and play really well with a variety of technologies that are in their environments,” she said. “But of course, as our business and portfolio has grown and expanded, the nature of the types of companies that are engaged in and around us shifts and changes too, and if it doesn’t, then we’re probably all going to have some issues down the road. I think it’s a lot driven by customers — what do they want all of us vendors to do to work together so their life is easier.”

Hands-off support

Speaking about Dell Technologies Inc.’s acquisition of EMC, VMware’s parent company, Matlock attested that the company will not commandeer VMware’s ecosystem. She said that Michael Dell has expressed this himself.

“He has never wavered from his commitment to support VMware’s independence, to support our ecosystem, and to really open up opportunities for us to grow at our full potential,” she stated. “And we’ve partnered with Dell for a decade — this is not new to us, and we have a great relationship with them regardless of the acquisition. I think the opportunities and the doors are going to open even further. There’s a lot more we can do together, but I really feel we’ve got a really good balance. He knows that our ecosystem is a core success factor for us.”

‘Simplify’ is the endgame

As with many things in IT, this greater depth and complexity has an ironic end goal: less complexity for the user. VMware goes to such lengths to expand its ecosystem with the intention of simplifying its customers’ daily lives, Matlock said.

“Simplify complexity is in our DNA. I think that it’s a little bit hard to say that today’s IT world is simple,” she stated. “I think we all have a long journey to really make IT simple. I think we’re about unleashing the innovation from IT, and in order to do that, you have to simplify the complicated, so they can focus on the strategic.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of VMworld 2016.

Photo by SiliconANGLE