Riccardo Di Blasio, SVP and GM for America sales at NetApp, joins theCUBE’s Rebecca Knight and Rob Strechay during the “Architecting outcomes in the Era of Intelligence” event to break down NetApp’s position in today’s competitive data landscape. In addition, Di Blasio outlines how the company remains a standout force in North America.
Drawing on decades of experience, including time with NASA and tech startups, Di Blasio offers a unique lens into NetApp’s data-centric DNA. He highlights the company’s standing as the largest pure-play data management firm, underscoring its adaptability across storage protocols and readiness to meet the complex demands of AI workloads.
Di Blasio emphasizes that NetApp thrives by winning both hearts and minds, delivering technical reliability alongside strong financial value. With an eye on AI-driven transformation, he positions NetApp as the go-to partner for enterprises seeking intelligent, scalable infrastructure tailored to innovation.
Forgot Password
Almost there!
We just sent you a verification email. Please verify your account to gain access to
NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence. If you don’t think you received an email check your
spam folder.
Sign in to NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence.
In order to sign in, enter the email address you used to registered for the event. Once completed, you will receive an email with a verification link. Open this link to automatically sign into the site.
Register For NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence
Please fill out the information below. You will recieve an email with a verification link confirming your registration. Click the link to automatically sign into the site.
You’re almost there!
We just sent you a verification email. Please click the verification button in the email. Once your email address is verified, you will have full access to all event content for NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence.
I want my badge and interests to be visible to all attendees.
Checking this box will display your presense on the attendees list, view your profile and allow other attendees to contact you via 1-1 chat. Read the Privacy Policy. At any time, you can choose to disable this preference.
Select your Interests!
add
Upload your photo
Uploading..
OR
Connect via Twitter
Connect via Linkedin
EDIT PASSWORD
Share
Forgot Password
Almost there!
We just sent you a verification email. Please verify your account to gain access to
NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence. If you don’t think you received an email check your
spam folder.
Sign in to NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence.
In order to sign in, enter the email address you used to registered for the event. Once completed, you will receive an email with a verification link. Open this link to automatically sign into the site.
Sign in to gain access to NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence
Please sign in with LinkedIn to continue to NetApp: Architecting Outcomes in the Era of Intelligence. Signing in with LinkedIn ensures a professional environment.
Are you sure you want to remove access rights for this user?
Details
Manage Access
email address
Community Invitation
Riccardo Di Blasio, NetApp
Riccardo Di Blasio, SVP and GM for America sales at NetApp, joins theCUBE’s Rebecca Knight and Rob Strechay during the “Architecting outcomes in the Era of Intelligence” event to break down NetApp’s position in today’s competitive data landscape. In addition, Di Blasio outlines how the company remains a standout force in North America.
Drawing on decades of experience, including time with NASA and tech startups, Di Blasio offers a unique lens into NetApp’s data-centric DNA. He highlights the company’s standing as the largest pure-play data management firm, underscoring its adaptability across storage protocols and readiness to meet the complex demands of AI workloads.
Di Blasio emphasizes that NetApp thrives by winning both hearts and minds, delivering technical reliability alongside strong financial value. With an eye on AI-driven transformation, he positions NetApp as the go-to partner for enterprises seeking intelligent, scalable infrastructure tailored to innovation.
Riccardo Di Blasio, SVP and GM for America sales at NetApp, joins theCUBE’s Rebecca Knight and Rob Strechay during the “Architecting outcomes in the Era of Intelligence” event to break down NetApp’s position in today’s competitive data landscape. In addition, Di Blasio outlines how the company remains a standout force in North America.
Drawing on decades of experience, including time with NASA and tech startups, Di Blasio offers a unique lens into NetApp’s data-centric DNA. He highlights the company’s standing as the largest pure-play data management...Read more
exploreKeep Exploring
the NetApp brand and technology platform compared to other competitors in the data management industry?add
What role does NetApp play in renovating data lakes and extracting value from data platforms?add
>> Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome back to theCUBE's live coverage of NetApp Converge 2025. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight. Sitting alongside, my co-host and analyst, Rob Strechay. Rob, storage doesn't excite everyone, but under the hood it's really driving a lot of transformation.
Rob Strechay
>> It does, and it's become ever more important with AI these days, and it just really is the baseline and the part of the core data platform.
Rebecca Knight
>> Well, a perfect segue to introduce our next guest, Riccardo Di Blasio. He is the SVP North America at NetApp. Thank you so much for coming on theCUBE, Riccardo.
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> Hello, Rebecca, and hello, Rob, and thank you for having me here.
Rebecca Knight
>> So you've been with NetApp, you're a technology veteran, but you've been with NetApp for just under a year. What drew you to the company?
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> Yeah, what a great question. Well, been in the industry for more than two decades, and I always been a huge fan of NetApp as a brand, as a company, but more important as a technology platform. And I have to say that the fundamentals didn't change. What I saw in NetApp is the best and more complete technology portfolio in the data management industry, which nobody has. And that's the reason why a lot of the former NetApp competitors are not anymore around, or they are around but on different names. And for almost three decades, NetApp logo is still here and it's the largest pure player of our industry.
Rob Strechay
>> How do you look at and what do you attribute the longevity to? And how have you seen a change? We've both been around the industry for a long time, and I think NetApp has kind of navigated that very distinctly in my view.
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> You absolutely right, and I've been actually experiencing this in the last 14 months I've been here. I never met a customer base so loyal like the NetApp clients for very simple reason. A, we're solving an important problem. It's not a nice to have. And B, we do in a very unique way, which is better than anyone else in the market. It may sound like a marketing slogan, but I think the longevity of our company paired with the longevity of our industry is actually proving my point. The people that are NetApp user, they love how simple it is, how reliable it is, how secure it is, and how connected it is, which are all table stakes for any technology decisions.
Rebecca Knight
>> So you're talking about NetApp's longevity, and it's been around about 30 years, which is sort of young adulthood, shall we say, in tech. When you look across the North American market, what do you see as the biggest opportunities for growth and how is NetApp positioning itself?
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> Absolutely. So we are blessed by another gigantic wave that is approaching us, which is the AI explosion more than the revolution. And quite frankly, I cannot think about AI without data. You cannot implement any AI model or training system if your data are not ready and in order. And so representing the company that is the leader of data management, particularly in the high end of the market, so in the enterprise market into the public sector market, this is where the majority of the AI project will start to take place. We feel uniquely positioned and advantaged to monetize that opportunity and to help our customer to make sure their AI project will be successful.
Rob Strechay
>> From a perspective of personas, again, being around the industry, there's a lot of talk about how there's really not storage people anymore inside of these organizations. How have you seen that really change the buying behavior of organizations and what they're looking for now?
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> No question about it. The amount of stakeholders that are involved into every decision process are a lot. Clearly, you still have the infrastructure people and the CIO offices, but any type of line of businesses, the finance people that have to support financially the decision. At the end of the day, Rob, like for any technology, every time you want to close a client, you need to make sure you win the technology discussion, meaning you have the best technology of all. You have to make sure you win the financial discussion, meaning you have the best ROI and TCO, and in certain area, you have to make sure you have the certain amount of customer intimacy and proximity in order to serve them better.
Rebecca Knight
>> You have worked closely with a number of startups as well as in the area of space innovation. How have those experience shaped how you think about emerging technology and NetApp's role?
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> That's a great question. I think my experience with NASA and the accelerator and the incubator with Bill called NASA iTech gave me a passion for innovation to constantly push the envelope and drive that level of innovation for an end user like a customer, a prospector, or a partner.
Rebecca Knight
>> Or an astronaut.
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> Or an astronaut.
Rob Strechay
>> How do you see, as we look ahead here, NetApp really driving that innovation with that, and as we look at data platforms are changing, people are trying to renovate their data lakes or take the sludge out of them, if you could say, and really get value out of their data. How do you see NetApp playing a role in that?
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> I think that I play a key and pivotal role in that layout you just described, Rob, because we're the only player that is capable to still provide the entire storage protocol available in the market. So we are a leader in file but also in block and object. But not only that, we're capable to mirroring those protocols and technologies into our partner, the different hyperscalers, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, everything operating from one single OS, which is on tap. That's really the type of innovation that we deliver to our customer, and that's the reason why customers still bet on that app after many, many years and will bet on that app for the future.
Rebecca Knight
>> Finally, AI is clearly reshaping how businesses think about their infrastructure. What are you hearing from customers that might surprise people? It could be either a shift in their priorities or a pain point that they're experiencing.
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> I think, Rebecca, with AI, there's a lot of new area where many of our customers are not prepared, and one of the area that generally are not prepared are the data. Are data rightly classified and organized and secure and protected and shared? So we really are a pretty important tool in the toolbox for them in order to choose the better AI vendor and platform and implement successfully the different AI project.
Rebecca Knight
>> Excellent. Riccardo, pleasure having you on theCUBE.
Riccardo Di Blasio
>> Thank you, Rebecca. Likewise. And thank you, Rob.
Rob Strechay
>> Thank you.
Rebecca Knight
>> I'm Rebecca Knight for Rob Strechay. Stay tuned for more of theCUBE's live coverage of NetApp Converge. You're watching theCUBE, the leader in enterprise news and analysis.
Rebecca Knight
Rob Strechay