Interview: CA's CEO focuses on systems management integration

HEADING INTO THIS week's CA World user conference in Orlando, Fla., Computer Associates (CA) President and CEO Sanjay Kumar is eager to pull off the covers of a new systems management integration package tailored toward Web services, and a brand-new, friendlier customer-oriented CA. InfoWorld Staff Writer Brian Fonseca sat down with Kumar to discuss why customers can expect to battle management complexity armed with Java and SOAP (simple object access protocol) tools, and the steps CA is taking to put to rest the controversies that have defined and plagued the software titan of late.

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InfoWorld: What is CA's primary focus heading into CA World this year?

Kumar: In the last year we have done a good job of focusing many parts of our company around the customer, [especially] the support organization [and] development organization. One of things we need to do better is to coordinate those pieces together. One of things we will talk about at CA World is [how] to bring those pieces together in terms of tying in the various components we [will] have in dealing with customers, CRO [customer relationship organization], and sales organization. It's important for us to articulate for customers what that means and how we [will] go about better servicing them.

InfoWorld: Will there be any technology announcements directly related to that message?

Kumar: We will announce a customer service portal, offering greater self-service and support. It's about how do we take four or five pieces we've been focused on and pull them all together. We're using technology to pull it together. For the last two years, all of our customer [information has] been recorded electronically. We can offer a complete relationship view, almost like a complete CRM [customer relationship management] view.

InfoWorld: As systems management becomes more complex and moves toward a distributed Web services environment, what can CA customers expect to be in store for Unicenter?

Kumar: We had a stand-alone Java management component we announced last year. With J2EE [Java 2 Enterprise Edition] already done, to make it include Web services is not a difficult thing to do from a technology point of view. Unicenter's Common Services component for [Version] 3.0 and its next release are fully architected to support [Web services]. It is the reason you haven't seen us partner with someone to do it. Our expectation when we unbundled the core had J2EE and Web services going down the Microsoft path [with .Net]. We made a calculated bet that [.Net] would be important for customers. It turned out to be true, and we're fortunate to have done that.

InfoWorld: The glory days of monolithic enterprise management frameworks appear to be over. How is CA responding to that challenge?

Kumar: [The software] buying mentality is different today. People are buying smaller chunks then ever before. I think a combination of both the technology change and the business model made a big difference, especially in the economy. By the way, we're using the technology and business architecture [of CA] to allow customers to competitively convert [from] other products. You get the Common Services component, you add what they need, [and] the fit becomes easier as well.

InfoWorld: How will CA transform its product line underlying the Common Services integration software to fit into users' hands at CA World?

Kumar: Customers are always focused on more integration. That's a big thing this year. Clearly the slowdown in the economy, the pull back in customer spending, the need to reevaluate [investments] given dot.com's not being successful has forced customers to look at customer spending, has forced more integration out of the box. A lot of what we heard last year [at CA World] revolved very heavily around integration in many different respects, in that [we've] had customers tell us [they] want integration [of storage] across platforms, [they] want it across various different kinds of [security] products. But, they want Unicenter to work better with eTrust and they want things [such as] across-platform and portal integration.

InfoWorld: How do the new, stringent storage and security management expectations fit into this tight-knit Common Services model for customers?

Kumar: Last year we were pretty clear when we talked [to customers] about the six [rebranded] focus areas of the company. [At CA World] we're delivering a portal front end to most of our technologies, including storage and security. Customers today are focused on managing storage in bits and pieces, and I think they're tired of that. They want to manage storage as a platform. We call it managing storage "without boundaries." The ability to display many different aspects of storage management, SANs [storage area networks], backup, [and] storage resource management [SRM] all in one place is critical. Storage [management] is probably No. 1 on customers' wish lists. A few things are planned around security; security has taken on a whole different meaning after Sep. 11. A big part of [CA's] message beyond portal and feature functionality is a lot of focus on sophisticated integration and a much higher degree of automation.

InfoWorld: CA has come under legal challenges and a preliminary inquiry by the SEC and the U.S. Attorney's Office for its accounting practices. Is the company being unfairly targeted?

Kumar: On our particular issue, we switched to a very simple revenue recognition model where [revenue] is recognized over life of the contract. It's a big change. To some degree, we're being pilloried for making the change because we're first, we're different. A lot of people in the marketplace use rumor [and] innuendo to describe motives to the change, I believe. Customers like it because it simply matches their investment needs and horizon on how we meet their needs.

InfoWorld: Are there any plans to return to the big money acquisition route that defined the company, for better or worse, just a few years ago?

Kumar: It has now been two years and one month since we announced any major acquisitions. The last [Sterling Software] was in February 2000. While you can never say never, for the foreseeable future the growth will continue to focus on lots of internal development. There will always be companies bigger than us -- IBM, Microsoft, Oracle -- but our focus is being "that e-business management company," and doing it well.

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