With the vast majority of companies running open-source software, this development model is gaining steam when creating the next generation of cloud-based infrastructure.

As the amount of data produced continues to mushroom because of digital transformation and modernization, data is emerging as the most expensive application layer. Instaclustr Pty. Ltd. tackles this challenge by lowering the ownership cost of enterprise data applications through its software-as-a-service platform for data layer and open-source technologies that can scale massively, according to Steve Francis (pictured), chief revenue officer and executive vice president of go-to-market operations at Instaclustr.

“Data layers are becoming strategic because organizations are looking at it and realizing the amount that they’re spending on this is eye-popping,” Francis stated. “We could drive those bills down … we are operational experts, so we can get people architected in the cloud more efficiently. And probably about a third of the time we save our customers cloud fees.”

Francis spoke with David Nicholson, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, during the AWS Startup Showcase: Open Cloud Innovations event. They discussed Instaclustr’s SaaS platform, open-source infrastructure and Cadence workflow, as well as its partnership with Amazon Web Services Inc. (* Disclosure below.)

Open source as a game-changer

With Instaclustr’s business model taking the SaaS provider route, Francis believes that this renders flexibility to customers by offering an exit ramp without being locked in, as opposed to open-core software.

“When our customers have an interest in using community open source, we’re the right partner for them … we’re not throwing a bunch of proprietary stuff in there,” he explained. “What we support is both the open-source project itself, and if there’s a gap in that open-source project, we’ll source something from the community … and if something does not exist in the community, we’ll write it ourselves and open source it and then support it.”

The managed data infrastructure provided by Instaclustr enhances scalability in a cost-effective manner, according to Francis.

“We have a big cost advantage over our customers …  if they want to go hire a seasoned Kafka, Postgres or Cassandra person, these people are incredibly expensive in the market,” he pointed out. “We can get those people relatively less expensive and then, with the automation that we have built into our platform, do all the operational tasks and handle all of the operational burdens on those different open-source projects.”

By curating technologies with high-scale capabilities, Instaclustr enables customers to solve big problems and conduct health checks, according to Francis.

“In addition to SaaS offerings for those open-source projects, where people can provision themselves clusters in minutes, we also offer support for all of the technologies that we offer on our SaaS platform,” he explained.

Despite fear, doubt and uncertainty being aired about open source, Francis believes it has gained the upper hand because its primary objective is to benefit the customer.

“When you look at who is using open source, community open source now … it’s kind of the who’s who in big business,” he noted.

Acquisition is part of the game for Instaclustr. It looks for popular technologies used to solve big problems but are complicated to manage, according to Francis.

“We added a Postgres capability … furthered Elasticsearch capability and really buttressed our capabilities there,” he said. “We look for things that kind of take the biggest, hairiest and earliest open-source projects for people to manage, and we handle the heavy lifting.”

Cadence workflow is on the horizon

Through its Cadence workflow, Instaclustr intends to make writing code much easier and optimize productivity. The open-source project will not only engage data operators and developers at the data layer, but also at the middle tier.

 “We’re going to be first to market globally with a SaaS offering for Cadence workflow,” Francis noted. “It’s a middle-tier project that is targeted at developers to increase developer productivity and developer velocity … especially for distributed applications that have workflow-like capabilities.”

By offering a good operational experience, Francis believes that customers get locked in through a natural alignment where their needs are met.

“We don’t lock them in with code … we make sure that they have a positive experience by taking a lot of that operational stuff off their hands,” he pointed out.

 With most Instaclustr customers running on AWS, Francis trusts that this partnership has ignited more growth.

“We’re growing fast, and we’re growing north of 50% last year … and closer to 60%,” Francis said. “We support multiple clouds … we support GCP and Azure and kind of give our customers the choice of what clouds they want to run on.”

If organizations have their own data center, Instaclustr provides on-premises managed service offerings and support contracts, according to Francis. 

“If they want to do it themselves and do a lot of the heavy lifting and just need sort of a red phone for emergency situations, we offer 24/7 support 365 support with 20-minute service levels for urgent issues.”

To get more traffic, Francis believes that Google and outbound have been effective go-to-market strategies.

“It’s a bit of a mix of high-touch, low-touch … we have tons of big logos,” he said. “Lots of our customers are household names, really big organizations, solving big problems, and that’s kind of where the bulk of our business is.”

Going global has widened Instaclustr’s scope by having marketing, engineering, sales and tech ops teams in areas such as Australia. “We’re super global … we have sellers in AsiaPac, in Europe, and lots in the States,” Francis said.

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the AWS Startup Showcase: Open Cloud Innovations event. (* Disclosure: Instaclustr sponsored this segment of theCUBE. Neither Instaclustr nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE