How the PC Reborn Will Revolutionize the Enterprise | The Six Five Summit

Hey everyone. Welcome back to the six five Summit. Daniel Newman, here, CEO of the Futurum Group.

We are in the modern work, uh, track today. This is a spotlight session. I'm very excited to bring on someone that I consider to be a personal friend, but also a very influential chief information officer, Cisco Sanchez of Qualcomm.

Someone I've spent a few days at the races with. I've spent a few days at events because Cisco, not only are you the CIO of Qualcomm, which is a company that we've worked with very much over the years, you're also customer zero in many cases. 'cause you are the CIO and you're deploying all this stuff.

Yeah, man. Uh, so first on, uh, Dan, it's really nice to see you and, and be part of this podcast. Uh, I think what you and and Pat do are fabulous.

So I we appreciate you. Um, and it's, it's nice to be part of this 'cause I, I am customer zero. All the great tech that we use, um, I have to implement, um, and then also tell where its needs improvements or where their gaps are.

But my goal is to make the sure that the software is better than anything that's out there on the market. And, and we're doing a pretty good job at it, right? Yeah.

You gotta build, you gotta build the technology stack that enables the company to build new products and ser services solutions get them into market, is dependable. Right? The stuff has to work and, uh, your teams need to be empowered, uh, to get stuff done, right.

And when, so whether it's someone's laptop goes down, your, your network goes down, you know, I know it's not actually you in the rack, you know, plugging the cables in anymore. You probably, oh, well you can't become a CIO. Well, you can, but you really shouldn't become a CIO at least at one point.

You haven't desperately been trying to get a server back up or get a network, uh, you know, up and running or you, you know, set yourself in on fire in the back of a rack somehow. Yeah. Or bringing an application up in the middle of the night.

Yeah, yeah. All of that. Yeah.

Or, you know, getting a note from your CEO in the morning saying, why am I not getting email uhhuh? Why? Yeah.

But, uh, it is what it is. Listen, the customer zero trend is super hot right now. Like the tech industry sort of loves putting themselves out there and saying, we are going to drink our own champagne.

I won't use the dog food analogy. I've never quite understood that to me. But, you know, let's talk about PCs because you will be, you know, tens of thousands of employees.

You have, um, a new architecture, new PCs, a new copilot plus product in market. I have to imagine that everyone's got a note that says, ship back the old crap. We're sending you something great.

And by the way, I'm not actually calling anyone stuff crap. I'm having a little bit of fun. But the point is, you're gonna probably deploy this enterprise wise.

So talk a little bit about the innovations going on in the PC space and why this is so attractive to you as A-C-C-I-O. Yeah, yeah. So, so there's a few things.

This pc, uh, is amazing. I mean, it really is. And the, the three things that we look at is, is how is the performance?

Because it matters. How fast can you innovate? How fast can you create something?

How fast can the next chimp design? How fast can you get the finance report, sales report, whatever. So, so performance does matter.

Battery life matters. And so the battery life is important because I'm gonna run it all day and I want it to be, I don't want to carry this, this charger with me everywhere I go. And then the third thing that is the new wave is, man, this AI thing is taking off like crazy.

And it's super exciting. But AI on edge is born. You know, if you have a cloud, you need an edge.

And that's where the AI on edge is gonna be really a super attractive, because I can start to move models to the, to the edge, make the compute more, more reliable, more functional, it's more secure. It's my data sets. So it's very, very attractive.

And the, the reason for this, this next revolution that's going on right now is a couple pivot points. Remember the pandemic happened in 2021 around there, and we all kind of refreshed, uh, bunch of PCs because everybody's gonna work from home. And so we said, ah, we need to get people new PCs.

So, so that happened. And typically people are on a four year refresh cycle, mostly enterprises, because you can't get a new PC every day. And so there's a refresh cycle happening.

Yep. So that's kinda the first pivot point so that there's something happening. The second pivot point is Windows 10 to Windows 11 is happening.

It's going to happen. Windows, end of Windows 10, end of life is coming soon. So as a CIO and IT professional, you're making choices.

After we start to refresh some of my fleet, I have to identify what's the next thing coming on the, on the, on the wave. How do I make sure that I set my team up for the right success? And this a I PC is born.

And you know, it's, it's interesting the, the Microsoft Co-pilot plus the recall capabilities fabulous. But do we think that's the end of it? You know, I Hope Me, me too.

So we're making bets on this. I PC has more abilities and more capabilities are that are start to mature. And I'm gonna make a safe bet to ensure that I can ensure my workforce is ready for it and be more productive.

Well it's like the software. Yeah. It's like the software defined vehicle.

I mean, the cool thing about like, you know, and I know you have Snapdragon, but like, just as for relatability purposes, like people like Tesla's a lot. Part of what they like about it though is that the car's not finished. Maybe the physical appearance of it's finished, but like it gets an upgrade, it changes the whole experience of the car.

I mean, right. That's kind of the, when you have all this additional horsepower, you got the NPU that can do all this. It's like we probably haven't really imagined entirely what's possible.

We've only put the first kind of alpha beta cases out there. There's a whole bunch of stuff that the developers in your community and other communities are gonna build and develop. They're gonna create hacks and productivity and efficiency that people should be super excited about.

Well, and and, and I am, I mean, I think, you know, the sexy, the PC's now sexy again. You know, before it was just kind of a commodity. I, I gotta use.

But now that I can throw software on top of it, add more capability. Did you do the sexy back? I thought you just did.

Yeah, I Was trying. I don't wanna saw, but yeah, I see it. I got it, I got it.

Uh, but, uh, you know, putting, uh, the ability for more software to be, uh, upon your PC becomes more personal. It becomes yours. Uh, I I think this is part of the next, uh, wave that is gonna be super interesting for all of us.

But, you know, architecture matters and more than anything, and and Dan, you know this, you've done this a long time. The way that the PC is constructed with the C-P-U-G-P-U and you mentioned the NPU and having the dedicated NPU on on the device to, to start rolling your l lms, you don't, you don't impact the performance of your spreadsheets and your word in Excel. Um, you don't impact the, the performance of your video.

It, it's dedicated. And so that's what makes it super interesting and, and allows for kind of the, the, the PC to be reborn properly. That's why it's sexy.

Yeah. I'm glad you double clicked too on the MPU because you know, I was gonna ask you about that. But that effectively, you know, this is part of that whole chip architecture now of having the different chips that can offload workloads that can give more efficiency and, and, and part of the whole Qualcomm and the whole original idea of moving compute, whether it, even the Mac like to, to the arm was about efficiency.

And so the thing has to last longer. And if we're doing all these more intensive compute activities, Cisco on the device we're recalling, which by the way, one thing I do wanna say about recall, 'cause I gotta, I gotta keep moving. I could talk to you all day, buddy, but the one thing I wanna say about it is a lot of people got all sensitive about like, well, you're, you're, it's, it's tracking you and it's taking a lot of step and, and, and yes, but no, it's taking it And the settings as such are on your device, meaning that it's tracking it and it's becoming a convenience for you.

Now, if you wanna upload things to the cloud, they'll always be that option for you to do that. And of course the companies probably like it that you do that, but you don't have to do that. And that's really an important distinction because this can be a great data-driven experience for the users, but keep the data safe, which is going to become, I don't know, I have these debates about how important it becomes.

'cause we really are all about experience. Sometimes we're like, I don't care. I'll share it all.

But enterprises have to be sensitive to that. We mentioned recall. Can you give me some other good examples of use cases?

Yeah. Of on device versus in the cloud? Yeah.

Uh, first off, so I I, I actually agree with this, with the security on, and it's on my device. It's me, it's mine. I have a password.

We also carry these, these devices with us all the time, uh, phone devices with us all the time. And so if they really are tracking, they've been tracking for a long time. But the, the way that copilot and the, um, recall is working, and, and by the way, and I think you know this right now, it's exclusively to Snapdragon because of the number of, of Tops available on our IP it takes 40 tops to, to run.

We have 45 tops. So that's why Microsoft made a big, big, uh, spiel about it and rightfully so. 'cause it's a pretty cool, uh, feature set.

But I don't think recall is the only capability and it's not. And we're seeing all the other ones starting to mature in, in that space to take advantage of the NPU. So recall being a cool one, and it's localized, it stays with you, but you're starting to see, you know, coding that's being more secure.

You're starting to see more creative capabilities being more secure. You, you're seeing even like DJ starting to use capabilities on the AI to make it even faster. And so I think it's just the beginning of all of the other stuff that's going to start to mature that needs to be localized.

And, and you know, my, my belief, uh, Dana and I, well we'll see how it plays out making a bet is that today we use, uh, uh, a lot of GPUs in the cloud to do, uh, common inference stuff. Make a request. You don't need to do you, You, you don't need to.

That's the point is like, and I think that will help us in a lot of ways where I don't have to go to the cloud. I don't have to make that, that, that call. I could save some money.

I don't have to do it on prem. I can do it on the device and actually leverage the hardware all through the whole stack. So you can get efficiencies through your, your edge, your laptop to on-prem if you have some or to the cloud where it's available.

And I think all three, you can work in harmony and it's not just one or the other. That's why I think cloud and Edge need to work together because you can move some of the LMS that are appropriate to the edge and run efficiently and, and probably cost a little bit more, uh, a little better to be faster to be able secure. And so I think that's the next wave that, that we are just dipping our toe into.

And I think it's super exciting, to be honest. Yeah, it's, it's, it is pretty interesting Cisco as you, as you think through this, and I like that you mentioned that I, I've been a big proponent to where inference happens a lot of it on CFUs so people can maximize those. Of course, a lot of it on PC can be done on device flash device.

All of them have some Qualcomm thing going on. So I, I'm safe no matter what I flash. Um, and then of course, um, going forward though, we've got these big power envelope challenges and you know, I have a feeling at some point, I know you guys have done your AI 100, uh, edge, You know, and, and I'm a user too, by the way of the AI 100 Ultra I User, but I can't imagine that's it.

You guys are gonna do more. I, I, I'm not, I'm not gonna speak for you, but there's gonna be more. Qualcom was gonna address this whole edge inference thing.

I just see it as an opportunistic space for you and it will be on device, but your whole industrial plays and stuff, there's lots of compute that needs to be done. Hey, um, we got a few minutes left here and I want to put your CIO customer zero hat on. I'm gonna ask you a question that I want you to kind of talk to me about your business, and then I want you to give some advice to your fellow CIOs out there.

You know, how do you see this PC copilot plus a I PC lots of names, trend transforming your workforce, and how are you sort of, you know, how would you kind of communicate the it's time to change, time to invest to all the other CIOs that are likely gonna be asking you as you start to roll this out? Yeah, so, uh, the first part, I, I think this new pc, the Snapdragon PC actually enables better productivity. And I, I think we've all went to this wave of higher, not higher, higher, not higher.

And, and now it's how do you get better efficiencies on the things that we're trying to accomplish across the board. And so I think the PC that the A IPC is gonna allow for productivity to, to gain on the edge, um, with you, to allow you to be a, a better employee, but a better creative, a better dj, a better whatever. Um, and so I think that's the, the, the way that's gonna happen.

I, I really do think so. And, and so that's gonna be efficiency gains that you get out of it. I also think that if we care about the earth, you know, there is no planet B yet.

Um, how do you ensure that you're, you're conscientious of how you're doing workloads and, and the, the IPC, by the way, allows for that? 'cause you start moving workloads where they should be more closer to the user. So I think it's another good thing.

What I would tell my, my fellow CIOs and, and they've asked, yeah, like, don't I just need my decision scientists to use this pc? The answer is no. This is PCs for everybody.

And I, I think how fast chat GPT went into the market, it was, it's a year and a half ago, by the way, when chat GPT first launched and everybody wanted to use it. Um, this is how fast the a I PC is gonna move of people wanting to identify and adopt and use. And so I don't want my CIO friends to fall behind for their companies for who they are because I love this industry.

I think it's a great one. So the urgency is, is you gotta start to adopt technology to help enable your team members to be more, uh, uh, more effective and more productive. Because that's what they need.

They need to be better. They need to be better at their jobs. And, and so what the leap of faith is to identify, how do I take a different architecture?

You have to make a change. The fork in the road is coming. You wanna go through the old path, the old architecture, the old ways, or do you wanna start to lean into the technology because the technology's gonna change for better and continue changing.

And, and I think that's the, that's the phase that we're all in and, uh, high urgency for, for them to act now and not wait. 'cause I think we have to, You know, Cisco, that's well said. Appreciate you putting that out there.

I think, um, you know, in this community among CIOs, I know peers have to listen to peers because while of course analysts give great perspectives, it's also great to hear from others that are going through these same challenges. You're running a really large organization with a lot of complexity and I appreciate you leading from the front. And of course, I appreciate you drinking your own champagne.

Of course. Um, Cisco, let's do this again. Perhaps I'll see you on the track.

I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I know you're gonna root for, for Lewis and uh, George, I'm going to continue to root for Orlando, but I always do appreciate the chances that we have to spend time in different parts of the world. I appreciate you joining us here at the six five Summit. Let's talk soon.

Let's talk about how those copilot plus PCs are doing, um, in a year's time or maybe even sooner. Yeah, you got it Daniel. Thank you.

Alright everyone, you earned it here. Cisco Sanchez, CIO of Qualcomm. What a great conversation customer Zero, doing it in his own organization.

Of course, sharing bits of wisdom for all of you out there that are going through these transformations in your own business. We hope you appreciate it. Glad you tuned in.

Stick with us here at the six five Summit. Gonna set it back to the team in the studio.