CNBC Asia - Interview with Rami Rahim

0:01 foreign

0:04 Network CEO ramirahim is here to talk

0:08 about uh his company's business strategy

0:10 he joins us live around the desk here

0:11 for a nice change at the sgx Romney

0:13 great to see you welcome and good

0:15 morning and welcome to Singapore of

0:17 course you're you're here let's get this

0:18 out of the way first for F1 Formula One

0:21 yes yes we have a customer event in fact

0:23 here that's all around Formula One we're

0:26 sponsoring Aston Martin as a team and

0:28 I'm really really looking forward to

0:30 hosting our customers and visiting

0:32 customers here in the region excellent

0:34 and I mean what what sort of message uh

0:37 do you have for your customers when you

0:39 uh when you manage to get FaceTime with

0:41 them yeah absolutely you know I think

0:43 the history of networking of it has been

0:46 around scale and performance it's about

0:48 keeping up with the insatiable demand

0:50 for network capacity I think the future

0:53 is about battling complexity and Juniper

0:55 I think better than anybody else is

0:57 employing and leveraging artificial

0:59 intelligence to crush the costs of

1:02 running networks and to improve the end

1:04 user experience of those networks that's

1:07 the key message that's resonating with

1:09 our customers around the globe

1:10 especially here in the in the region

1:14 rewarded those names that are really

1:17 strongly positioned towards the cloud

1:20 and that build out data centers Etc and

1:23 where are you on that journey and how

1:25 concerned are you about a pullback in

1:27 Enterprise spending in this environment

1:29 with recession potentially looming yeah

1:31 a ramp cloud cloud is probably the

1:34 biggest Trend that is affecting all of

1:37 our business and our segments

1:39 Enterprises are moving workloads and

1:41 applications to the cloud they're

1:42 leveraging the cloud to streamline their

1:45 operations Cloud providers of course are

1:47 investing massive amounts in their

1:49 infrastructure to keep up with Cloud

1:50 demand and service providers as they

1:53 move towards 5G what people fail to

1:55 realize sometimes is that 5G is natively

1:58 a cloud-based architecture and

2:00 increasingly it'll be even more

2:01 cloud-based in the future we are

2:03 addressing all of these Trends and we're

2:06 doing it with differentiated technology

2:08 and solid execution this is why even

2:10 through the dark days of the pandemic

2:11 over the last couple of years we've

2:13 grown our business so I'm actually

2:15 really proud of the strategy but then

2:17 more so the execution that's around

2:19 Cloud so you're questioning around you

2:21 know are we concerned so far demand

2:23 signals for our business I think are

2:26 very solid they're robust and I think

2:27 that's because of the fact that the

2:29 pandemic has shined a big light on the

2:32 importance of what we do at Juniper and

2:34 delivering connectivity to everybody

2:37 that uses the network for practically

2:39 any reason today it's absolutely a very

2:42 strong longer term secular growth story

2:46 but in the current environment we are

2:48 hearing even uh strong tech companies

2:53 pulling back

2:54 recommitting on spending Capital

2:57 spending and even talking about Job

3:00 freezes and layoffs where are you where

3:03 is Juniper in that narrative and should

3:05 we expect any kind of confessional ahead

3:07 of earnings season you know I have to

3:10 say that so far we have not seen any

3:12 meaningful weakness in demand signals

3:15 the demand for our technology remains

3:18 robust and I believe part of that has to

3:21 do with the fact that we are in a space

3:23 that's resilient digital transformation

3:25 is a thing I think digital

3:27 transformation projects among our key

3:29 vertical segments are going to be

3:31 protected but I also believe that it's

3:33 solid execution we have a vast Market

3:35 opportunity we have relatively low share

3:38 we have strong differentiation

3:39 technology that should allow us to grow

3:41 even in a difficult Market environment

3:44 should that transpire over the coming

3:46 year so talk about difficult Market

3:48 environment I mean last night your stock

3:50 did really well of about two and a half

3:52 percent along with the broader Market of

3:53 course but you've underperformed formed

3:55 the s p this year and you know if you

3:57 take a look all the way back to 2017

3:59 which was about five years ago the stock

4:01 is pretty much where it was then it's

4:04 basically gone nowhere what are you

4:06 telling investors right now you know I

4:08 focus on the fundamentals of the

4:09 business and I have to say over the last

4:11 two to three years in particular as we

4:14 have really focused to diversify our

4:16 strategy and to expand our offering

4:18 especially in the Enterprise space we

4:21 have driven tremendous results in Top

4:23 Line for this company and I think we're

4:25 in the early Innings of that performance

4:28 I I solidly believe that as we continue

4:31 to execute on this strategy we offer the

4:33 kinds of differentiation that really

4:34 matters to our customers today our stock

4:37 price will eventually follow suit Rami

4:39 just uh quickly when you look at the

4:41 externalities uh Juniper is it

4:43 collateral damage in any way potentially

4:45 from the U.S China trade tensions and

4:48 the U.S restrictions on licensing AI

4:51 chips to China you know no it has not

4:54 actually been in big impact and it's

4:55 partly because of the fact that China is

4:57 not a massive market for us yet we

4:59 actually do see opportunities there but

5:01 we're very selective in where we compete

5:04 for the most part it has not really

5:06 affected us but I will say as a CEO of a

5:08 technology company what we would hope

5:10 for is an opportunity to compete

5:12 globally and openly based on the merits

5:15 of our technology and to the extent that

5:17 that becomes more and more possible

5:19 we're very happy with that we'll let the

5:21 politicians deal with the

5:23 um you know the negotiations on that

5:24 front understood Rami thank you very

5:26 much indeed for uh either one of the

5:28 Aston cars if they have a chance at a

5:30 podium I I sure hope so yes okay all

5:34 right we'll see you then uh come fourth

5:36 and fifth yeah it's a good job on

5:38 competing with my Nissan almero I'll

5:40 beat them all hands down uh Rami thank

5:42 you very much indeed for the ramad Rahim

5:43 uh Juniper Networks

5:47 [Music]