VMblog:  If you were giving a VMware Explore attendee a quick overview of the company, what would you say?  How would you describe the company?

Robert Daigle:  Lenovo is a leading technology company. We've been around for many years in the IT infrastructure space, from PC, Smart devices, Motorola phones, tablets, all the way up to the data center. We've got some really great products in the data Center for customers and have been a long-standing partner with VMware. We are really excited about showcasing some of the great things we're doing for AI infrastructure, all the way from the edge into the data center.

VMblog:  Do you have any speaking sessions during the event?  If so, can you give us the details?

Daigle:  Yes, we have several! Here's a quick rundown of what we're presenting:

• Monday, Aug. 21 - 11:00 am to 12:30 pm
  "The Automated Build and Management of Multi-Environments as a Service". We will be presenting our centralized tool to automate actions across all environments.
• Tuesday, Aug. 22 - 1:00 to 1:45 pm
  "Afirst-classenterprise readyhybrid cloud solution from Lenovoand VMware". This 45-minute session illustrates common business requirements for customers looking to deploy workload across clouds.
• Tuesday, Aug. 22 - 2:30 to 3:00 pm
  "Make an Agile Move to the Edgewith Lenovo and VMware". Is a meet-the-expert roundtable where the audience will learn what they're capable of doing with our solutions, from how our technology ensures the highest level of uptime, to near Zero Touch Provisionins (nZTP), to automation, to our integrated Datacenter Infrastructure Management DB and xClarity integrtion.
• Tuesday, Aug. 22 - 3:30 to 3:55 pm
  Lenovo and VMware - Evolution of Solutions
  This session will show how these companies align to reduce upfront costs and ease the ongoing management burden on customers as well as decrease the complexity in solution verticals.
• Wednesday, Aug. 23 - 2:00 to 2:30 pm
  AI from Edge to Cloud
  The panel of experts will discuss current customer challenges and potential solutions gleaned from their experience in the field. We will also take a sneak peek into the future of the industry and what lies ahead in this exciting technological frontier.

VMblog:  Are you giving away any prizes at your booth or participating in any prize giveaways?

Daigle:  Yes. We're giving away many prizes at our booth and during our keynotes, be sure to visit us at our booth (#205), attend any of our 26 booth theater sessions throughout the event (each is less than 10 minutes long!), learn, and win prizes!

VMblog:  How do you partner with VMware and fit into their ecosystem?

Daigle:  We have a long-standing partnership with VMware, as one of the leading partners delivering VMware solutions out into the market.

If you look back over the past few years, we've been one of the leading OEM partners for VMware, delivering servers that are ready for VMware technology and also appliances that contain the full solution stack for our customers, from vSAN to vSphere, and all of the above. And we're really excited about some of the ways we're going to continue that into the AI realm.

VMblog:  Can you provide a rundown of Lenovo's different technology offerings? What kind of message will an attendee hear from you this year?

Daigle:  Across the spectrum, from desktops to data center, from the pocket to the cloud, Lenovo has some very compelling offerings in partnership with VMware.

One of the things that we're going to be sharing at VMware Explore 2023 is what we're doing together for generative AI.

With all the buzz that's going around related to ChatGPT and generative AI, organizations are struggling to make sense of how to utilize large language models in business applications, manage them securely and ethically.

We have a compelling offering that we will be announcing this week in partnership with VMware and NVIDIA around deploying large language models in your data center in a scalable way.

VMblog:  What makes Lenovo stand out among vendors at VMware Explore?

Daigle:  If you come by the Lenovo booth, you'll actually get to experience an interaction with a photorealistic AI avatar. You can ask questions, and the responses are powered by a large language model, all running on a vSphere environment on a Lenovo server.

It's going to be a cool interactive experience, showing the power of generative AI and how you can deploy this in your VMware and Lenovo environment.

We're excited to be sharing this and announcing our generative AI reference architecture at the event.

VMblog:  Can you share other announcements that you'll be making at the show, including the multi-year partnership with VMware?

Daigle:  There's a lot that we're packing in, but we're particularly excited about what we're doing with generative AI, enabling it for enterprises of all sizes, and democratizing artificial intelligence. This is powerful and compelling for organizations attending VMware Explore.

We have a multi-year, deep partnership with VMware that we'll be showcasing, including some things we've done around Project Monterey, continuing into the 2024 timeframe.

VMblog:  What trends or themes is Lenovo focusing on? What else are you looking at for 2024?

Daigle:  AI is a big part of it, and not just because it's my job at Lenovo. We've been working on AI initiatives since 2017, building our AI business. It's a long-term commitment, and you'll see exciting things from Lenovo into 2024 around artificial intelligence. It's about bringing compute closer to where the data is, moving more AI compute into edge.

We're going to be showcasing some edge products at the VMware Explore event and expanding that into 2024. We have more offerings from the edge to the data center to support AI workloads, and more software tools to make AI even more democratized.

We're focusing on bringing forward practical business applications that provide value, not just interesting science projects. Look out for things from our Lenovo AI Innovators program and Lenovo AI Discover labs.

VMblog:  For those unable to attend the event, where can they find more information about Lenovo's initiatives?

Daigle:  You can go to www.lenovo.com/AI and learn all about some of the AI solutions and capabilities that we're building at Lenovo.