In this interview from theCUBE + NYSE Wired: Google Cloud Partner AI Series, Shelby Johnston, Director of North American Corporate Sales at Google, and Simon Anderson, senior vice president of Cloud at CDW, join theCUBE’s John Furrier to discuss how their strategic partnership is accelerating generative AI adoption across the enterprise. Johnston and Anderson explore the significant growth driven by the "open cloud" approach, which allows CDW to deliver best-of-breed technology to a massive customer base spanning manufacturing, retail and real estate. The conversation highlights the immediate ROI of Gemini Enterprise, specifically its ability to connect disparate data sources at scale to drive operational efficiency and transform complex workflows.
The discussion also delves into the evolution of cloud selection, as customers shift from prioritizing cost efficiency toward choosing innovation partners that offer a full AI stack. Anderson provides specific insights into the impact of AI in the education sector, noting how Gemini is being used to automate administrative tasks in K-12 environments to return teachers to the classroom. From modernizing legacy infrastructure to scaling agentic workflows, Johnston and Anderson outline the roadmap for moving AI from proof-of-concept to production. They emphasize that the future of the partnership lies in deep integration across data, security and collaboration to help organizations realize the full potential of the AI era.
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Shelby Johnston, Google & Simon Anderson, CDW
What happens when cloud innovation meets partner agility? In this episode of the Google Cloud Partner AI Series, theCUBE Research’s John Furrier sits down with Jim Anderson, VP of North America partner ecosystem and channels at Google Cloud, for a candid and forward-looking conversation. Together, they unpack how AI is reshaping Google’s partner playbook — and what that means for the future of enterprise transformation.
Anderson shares how partners are shifting from transactional relationships to long-term, journey-based engagements — mirroring the evolution of AI itself. By integrating Google Cloud’s core AI capabilities with their domain expertise, partners can accelerate time-to-value and deliver smarter, more contextual solutions that meet the growing demands of enterprise customers.
Key Highlights:
• How Google Cloud’s full AI stack is driving innovation across industries
• The rise of AI agents and why they're set to surpass SaaS in enterprise value
• The evolving role of partners in delivering scalable, high-impact solutions
• Democratization of computer science and how it’s enabling the next wave of creators
• Jim’s take on the future of the ecosystem, customer co-selling and partner growth strategies
With rapid innovation as a constant, Anderson emphasizes the need for partners to be adaptable and future-focused. He highlights how Google Cloud’s infrastructure provides a solid foundation for experimentation, growth and AI-driven transformation. The message is clear: partners who lean into AI integration will lead in delivering differentiated value and stronger business outcomes.
play_circle_outlineGoogle and CDW: Multi-Year Partnership Delivering Workspace and Gemini Enterprise for Scalable Data Connectivity and Competitive Advantage
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play_circle_outlineCDW at Scale: POC-to-Production, Rapid ROI and Services Monetization Driving Manufacturing and Back‑Office Transformation
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play_circle_outlineAgentic Workflows: Transforming Enterprise Work with Training, Enablement, and Guardrails for Safe Deployment
In this interview from theCUBE + NYSE Wired: Google Cloud Partner AI Series, Shelby Johnston, Director of North American Corporate Sales at Google, and Simon Anderson, senior vice president of Cloud at CDW, join theCUBE’s John Furrier to discuss how their strategic partnership is accelerating generative AI adoption across the enterprise. Johnston and Anderson explore the significant growth driven by the "open cloud" approach, which allows CDW to deliver best-of-breed technology to a massive customer base spanning manufacturing, retail and real estate. The c...Read more
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How would you describe CDW's relationship with Google and the business impact of Gemini Enterprise for your customers?add
How do you see generative AI adoption affecting your business and partner network—particularly in terms of customer value, deployment friction, and how it will be monetized?add
How do you see CDW and Google implementing agentic workflows using Gemini, what key use cases do you foresee, and what organizational changes (training/enablement and human oversight) will be required?add
>> Welcome back around to theCUBE. Here at our NYC studios, of course, we have our Palo Alto studios connecting Silicon Valley and Wall Street. I'm John Furrier, host of theCUBE. We're here for the Google Cloud Partner Showcase, where we unpack the best practices, what leaders are doing to move the needle in the generative AI era for customers, of course, implementing those technologies like agents and everything else around data. Got two great guests here. Shelby Johnson, director of North American Corporate Sales for Google. Simon Anderson, SVP of cloud at CDW. Great to see you again. Thanks for coming on. Appreciate it.
Simon Anderson
>> Thanks John.
Shelby Johnston
>> Hey, thanks for having us.
John Furrier
>> Love the partner showcase, because it's really Google's top partners who are innovating. Talk about the relationship, Simon, with Google and how that's working out.
Simon Anderson
>> So CDW has had a strong relationship for five or six years, and very deep with delivering workspace to both education and now corporate. And now Gemini, of course, has come along, Gemini Enterprise, and just blown past the competition in terms of the capability, and the use cases, and the connectivity to the data sec. So it's very exciting times to be partnering with Google in go to market.
John Furrier
>> Can you say that again? Because I think this is a point that people are, some are seeing that are in the industry, but I think people are realizing the real impact of Gemini to the business.
Simon Anderson
>> Gemini in a lot of our customer use cases, the ability to be able to use it at scale, but also connect different data sources is just incredible. And so working together, we're able to get incredible outcomes in terms of efficiency and growth for customers.
John Furrier
>> Shelby, talk about the relationship. We've been following Google, as you know, you guys made some good bets on how to engage with partners, with the stack, but also integrations, and being very relationship-oriented intentionally. Talk about the relationship with CDW and how that's going from your side.
Shelby Johnston
>> Absolutely. So from a Google perspective, our partner ecosystem is critical to our long-term growth from a scale perspective. So we absolutely need our partners to help us drive innovation across our tech stack. So from a CDW perspective, we've been working with them, like you said, for several years. However, 2025 was our best growth year with them, from a customer acquisition standpoint, from a channel AI perspective. So we really do feel like we are just at the beginning of the growth that we could drive together, which is very exciting. I would say also as Google Cloud, built in our DNA has always been that we're an open cloud. We want to make it easy for customers, support their data in and out. And so openness is really key to how we partner, and it's actually quite a nice synergy with CDW, who works with many different partners, and brings the best of breed of technology to their customers. So I think we're just at this stage where it's kind of coming together in a really nice way, and AI is certainly the tip of the spear of where we're going to go together.
John Furrier
>> Simon, talk about the impact of Google's openness, their scale. Obviously they have great security. We've covered that, people that watch theCUBE, they know all this. You guys touch a lot of customers, a lot of diverse customers at all aspects of their consumption, for either IT or products. So you're in all the accounts. How does the cloud play that you're overseeing bring in more value for the customer with Google?
Simon Anderson
>> The market is really sort of coming to where CDW sits. So CDW has hundreds of thousands of customers, a lot of manufacturing, retail, real estate. So you think of it as the middle of corporate America, and with, now, generative AI adoption at over 80% in one or more business function generally, the demand for really the table stakes, which is like, how do you bring this whole new technology for searchability, for document summarization, for transforming workflows into the enterprise and mid-market? And so the market is really sort of coming to where we are. And the difference, I think, that we are seeing from prior technology revolutions is that the value's there. I mean, we can immediately demonstrate ROI working closely with Google and the incredible technology that it brings to the table for customers. Efficiency, new workflows and so on. So it really is a moment
John Furrier
>> Whenever I've seen new technologies come into partner networks, there's an adoption, and then how do I deploy it? Is there friction? Does it make money? And does it serve the customer? And the customer comes first. So you're close to the customer, you're providing the benefits with the cloud. How do you see that evolve in that equation? Talk about the customer value, and then the money-making. Because you can wrap services around cloud, it's got a lot of leverage. You got operating leverage with the cloud, you got domain expertise with what's going on with the customer motion. Talk about how you see the business model and the customer deployment, satisfaction piece of it connecting.
Simon Anderson
>> So as I was sharing, take manufacturing, for example. Manufacturing has a lot of facilities, typically all over the country or all over the world. They've got data in all these different pockets. So the open data approach that Google Cloud has with Gemini, we're able to connect different data sources very quickly, whether that's Salesforce, Box, other proprietary data sources. And the benefit is that, the ability to be able to query that data, use it for new workflows, start to add agentic capabilities is just something that corporations have never experienced before.
John Furrier
>> On the Google side, you guys are enabling this acceleration, faster product value, faster service value, and customers. How do you see this evolving?
Shelby Johnston
>> Yeah, what I would say is right now what we're seeing is quite an evolution away from, customers are not choosing a cloud provider for cost efficiency anymore. They're choosing a cloud provider as an innovation partner. And we're really seeing customers come to Google, and because they're choosing a partner for the future of their AI within their enterprise. And from a Google perspective, we really do see it as the value is in the full stack. Google as a product development company has really woven AI into every aspect of our platform. And we believe that, as I mentioned, openness. We also believe there's such an importance in having first-party tools as well. And we're really the only hyperscaler that has the hardware, the chips, all the way to the models. So we think that that's really the true competitive advantage. As customers are making these decisions, they're thinking about innovation.
John Furrier
>> Simon, we were talking before we came on camera about, see, there's education business for workspace, big customer, and a lot of customers around workspace, which we know has been very popular. Everyone has Gmail. We're a customer actually, on SiliconANGLE too. We love it. But Gemini adds an extra punch to the value. And is there an education crossover to Gemini? How do you see the Gemini workspace piece coming together? Is it resonating with customers?
Simon Anderson
>> Well, what's happening in education, so K through 12 in particular, is schools around the country have been very quick to adopt not only workspace, but then Gemini. They're starting with more back office functions. So think efficiency, just like a corporation. "How do we get teachers out of doing, 50% of their work is all this back office busy work, how do we get that down to 20% so they can get back in the classroom?"
So it's starting there. It's also being used for curriculum development and so on. It's not yet at the point, particularly in K through 12, where it's being used sort of actively in the classroom. But I think that will come, but it's really starting with that sort of progression. And CDW delivers close to 50% of all workspace through K through 12 in the US. So we've got a great experience, and I think it's really starting where ultimately the next generation of users are going to come from.
John Furrier
>> Yeah, the partnership's interesting with Google and CDW, because I think it hits a lot of the horizontal use cases. You mentioned the diversity, the range of customers. I guess the question for both of you guys would be, where's the unlock coming from in the growth and the money making? How would you see AI unlocking? Is there anything that jumps out at you, that guides on what's happening with the ... Where's that value? If people said, "Hey, where's the value being unlocked? Where's the secret path?"
Shelby Johnston
>> Yeah, so I think a lot of it is within the agentic workflow, which we really do see as the future. It is truly not just a one-off project, or chatbots, or AI subscriptions. It is truly remaking your enterprise with agentic workflow at the forefront of that. So I think that's really where we see everything going. And that is where I think we'll see the true kind of tipping point from that perspective.
Simon Anderson
>> And I'd add that, absolutely. But when you think of agentic workflows, it really is a transformation of the way people work at every level. And so I think step one is get the AI in the hands of the users, so they can really see the power of it. And as we've talked about, Gemini, incredibly usable. I use it myself extensively, whether that's for deep thinking, or whether it's for quick response, and so on. So just get it in the hands, that's part of the unlock. And then from there, as you start to build agentic workflows, I think one thing that is talked about but shouldn't be missed is there is really a transformation of how people work that's important. And so that training, that enablement, and that's where CDW comes in as well.
John Furrier
>> I'm glad you brought up agents-
Simon Anderson
>> -...
John Furrier
>> because that's the topic of the year, is agents. You've got to have the data. How do you see CDW and Google doing agents with Gemini? Any visibility on the key use cases with agents?
Simon Anderson
>> We are already implementing three or four different agents for a particular workflow that are effectively daisy-chained together in core industries. Once again, it typically doesn't start with in customer focused, it's back office manufacturing systems, and that sort of thing, but it's already happening. And of course with agents, you've got to balance out, when do you need human intervention, what are the guard rails? Those sort of things.
John Furrier
>> I mean, agents are great.
Shelby Johnston
>> Yeah, I mean, I think one other thing I would add, too, is the importance of modernizing the enterprise to be able to take true advantage of the opportunity with AI. So we haven't talked a lot about data, but honestly, it's going in and understanding how do you actually help a customer modernize their legacy infrastructure so that they can actually take advantage of the opportunity? I think that's a big piece of it too.
John Furrier
>> Yeah, agents definitely have a lot of headroom. I'd like to ask you guys to tell a story around some use cases and successes. You mentioned the education, K through 12. Are there other examples where the partnership, the dual, better together works?
Simon Anderson
>> Real estate is another classic sort of core industry. Of course, across commercial real estate, you've got all sorts of businesses in every aspect of the sector, but they tend to have data in silos. They tend to have workflows that are less modernized. And so there's a lot of work that we're doing in that to modernize those workflows and just make them much more efficient.
John Furrier
>> Got it. And the verticals are affected is everybody?
Shelby Johnston
>> Everybody.
John Furrier
>> AI is not a disruptive enablement. It's accelerating. No one gets disrupted. They disrupt themselves, I guess, but the AI is accelerating everything. All right. Final question. What's next on the partnership with CDW and Google? What are you guys working on? What's next? What's the next step?
Simon Anderson
>> From CDW's perspective?, part of my role as SVP of cloud is really to deepen the capabilities, like understand where we have gaps for delivering, Gemini, and Workspace, and the whole stack. And so we're working actively on that. That's really a key part of what we're focusing on, because we are seeing the demand, and now we need to convert it and we need to deliver it.
John Furrier
>> And what's your focus for the year in terms of what you're optimizing for for cloud?
Simon Anderson
>> Adoption, going from proof of concept to production, making sure that there's a very high adoption rate between POC and production is probably the key thing
John Furrier
>> Yeah, there's customers going there.
Shelby Johnston
>> That's a great one. Yeah, I think it's growth, simply. We have a ton of opportunity ahead of us, a ton of headroom in the partnership. So I think it's growing. We're growing at a very aggressive clip, but I think there's even more headroom in the partnership for us to scale, get AI in the hands of more of our customers. And just from a Google Cloud perspective, our priorities are always data, AI, security, and collaboration.
John Furrier
>> And you guys got hundreds of partners, 400 partners coming here in New York. Thanks for coming by and being featured in the showcase. Great to see you.
Simon Anderson
>> Absolutely.
John Furrier
>> Congratulations.
Simon Anderson
>> Thank you, John.
John Furrier
>> Google's continuing to , great year for you guys. Continuing to have great success. Gemini's a nice bump on that. Great product. Everyone loves it. Congratulations.
Shelby Johnston
>> Thank you so much.
John Furrier
>> All right. I'm John Furrier with theCUBE here, the Google Cloud Partner Showcase, we're going to share the best experience, but more growth and more innovations coming. We're doing our part here at theCUBE. Thanks for watching.
John Furrier