Cloud Partners with CIQ for Rocky Linux Support on GCP

CIQ YouTube channel (@CtrlIQ)

CIQ and Google Cloud have joined forces to provide mutual customers a direct and unified best-in-class support experience for Rocky Linux.

Webinar Synopsis:

• Explanation of Google Support

• Google Brings Stability and Support To Open Source

Speakers:

• Venkat Gattamneni, Product and Business Leader, Google

  • Linkedin

• Daniela Herrera, Partner Operations Manager, Tech Support, Google

  • Linkedin

• Zane Hamilton, Vice President, CIQ

  • Linkedin

• Gregory Kurtzer, CEO, CIQ

  • Linkedin

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Note: This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors.

Full Webinar Transcript:

Venkat Gattamneni:

This is, of course, very exciting for us to be announcing today. Fundamentally, what we have been doing undercovers for a while now, a good six to eight months now, we have been doing this with the CIQ team, is we are trying to build a model where customers can use Rocky Linux on the GCP platform, and should they have any issues from a support point of view, they can just lift the phone up and call Google. We will work to support customers, running Rocky on GCP or Google Cloud and treat the support experience just as we would with any other first-party service. I will let Danielle sort of explain a little bit more in detail as to what that entails. That is the primary thing we're announcing today. The big value proposition for customers is that now they can run with full confidence on the platform, Rocky Linux, and bring their workloads onto the platform. 

For those folks who are considering moving away from CentOS and looking for an option, they can rest assured that this is a very, very well-supported experience on the platform. Of course, from a support point of view, we are sharing this exciting news today, but we have a lot more we are working on, on the product side as well that we will be able to share in the next few minutes. Danielle, do you want to maybe give a quick detailed view on what the support engagement may look like for customers? 

Explanation of Google Support

Daniela Herrera:

Of course, and just plus one through everything you said, Venkat. Like you mentioned, we want customers to know that we will be providing a Google and CIQ-backed support experience for Rocky Linux. What that means is that if a customer has a problem with their Rocky Linux that they are running on GCE, they will be able to contact Google like they do for first-party products right now and we will take it from there, essentially; We will engage with CIQ as needed. And the reason we are doing this is because we want our customers to be comfortable and to be excited about really using Rocky Linux and make sure they are able to get the most out of it and have the most world-class experience that they can. 

Google Brings Stability And Support To Open Source

Zane Hamilton:

Greg, from a Rocky perspective, why is this so exciting? 

Gregory Kurtzer:

First off, this is exciting not just from a Rocky perspective, I think every perspective is super cool. I am going to describe this from the community standpoint, first and foremost. What we have seen over the years is we have seen open source projects come and go. We have seen them being led by various companies and led by various organizations. I think I would really focus on what makes an open source project stable. What we need right now is stability in that fundamental foundational operating system piece. What makes it stable is not just having a single company behind that operating system. It is having a whole group, a community of individuals, of organizations, of companies, even competing organizations if we can, and pull everything together then. By pulling everybody together and having that single unified commitment to that open source project, we are able to create this massive amount of stability in that project itself. 

That was really our goal with what we started off trying to do and trying to solve with Rocky. This partnership and this collaboration, both in terms of the community and open source space as well as now the value we can bring to that community and to customers, is just so incredibly exciting. What this keys in on is we can now take from the Google Cloud platform all the way up through that platform, through the operating system, to the end user, customer experience, the entire thing, is now supported. It is now a single unified solution. And because of that, again, it is just phenomenal. This partnership is really just first-in-class, customer-first. One more point, if you don't mind me hogging the mic. It really unifies this shared vision that we have with CIQ and Google in terms of solving problems and commitment to customers and customers first. Because of that, from the very first moment we started talking and collaborating on this, that alignment really is what just drove this commitment to bringing this forth to customers.