CyberTech Top Voice: Interview with Gluware’s Jeff Gray

Hello, CyberTech community. Welcome to our latest conversation in the CyberTech Top Voice interview series.

The latest CyberTech Interview with Gluware’s CEO Jeff Gray is an interactive Q&A-styled conversation. With a background rooted in the semiconductor and networking industries, Jeff has built a career around solving complex technological challenges and transforming how enterprises manage their networks. As a visionary leader, he co-founded Gluware, where the focus is on automating the intricate and often siloed infrastructures of modern networks. Jeff shares insights on the evolution of network automation, Gluware’s groundbreaking innovations, and how intelligent automation can drive efficiency, security, and scalability for global enterprises. With organizations increasingly relying on multi-vendor, multi-platform environments, Jeff discusses the critical role that platforms like Gluware play in simplifying network management and enabling businesses to stay ahead in a rapidly changing technological landscape.

Join us as we delve into Jeff’s journey, the transformative potential of intelligent network automation, and how Gluware is reshaping the future of network operations.

Hi Jeff, welcome to the CyberTechnology Top Voice Interview Series. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to choose this particular career path?

My journey in technology began in the semiconductor industry, where I discovered my passion for solving complex technical challenges while managing networking products for smart grid initiatives. This experience opened doors to new opportunities, leading me to be a management consultant to Deutsche Bank working between New York and Frankfurt, Germany.

The path continued through enriching roles, as Vice President of Business Development at Yelofin Networks, where I gained deeper insights into the networking world and then leading strategic business development at Firefly Communications – developing and deploying technical training for Cisco Systems business units and sales force globally. Each position added a new layer to my understanding of technology and business and understanding where the current state of networking can be improved.

But the most exciting chapter began when I connected with Olivier Huynh Van. We shared a vision of transforming how enterprises manage their networks, which led us to create Glue Networks, now known as Gluware. What started as an ambitious dream has evolved into a reality where we’re helping enterprises around the world automate their complex network infrastructure. Today, as we continue to innovate and shape the future of intelligent network automation, I’m proud of how far we’ve come and even more excited about where we’re heading.

What is the best definition of “Intelligent network automation”? Why do we need self-running enterprise networking systems?

Intelligent network automation is a sophisticated approach that automates and orchestrates complex network tasks across multi-vendor, multi-platform, and multi-domain environments. It goes beyond simple task automation by incorporating advanced capabilities that enhance network performance, security, and efficiency.

Gluware’s intelligent network automation platform offers a comprehensive suite of capabilities designed to address a wide range of network management challenges. For instance, it excels in audit and compliance, enabling organizations to maintain adherence to dynamic internal policies and industry regulations. The platform also facilitates patching at scale, significantly reducing security exposures across the enterprise in near real-time. Additionally, Gluware offers robust configuration drift detection and auto-remediation, ensuring network configurations remain consistent and secure. These examples, among many others, demonstrate how intelligent network automation can enhance security, maintain compliance, improve network stability, and streamline overall network operations. The flexibility of Gluware’s platform allows it to adapt to various network environments and address numerous other use cases specific to each organization’s unique needs.

At the heart of Gluware’s intelligent network automation capabilities lies Gluware DIAL (Device Interaction and Automation Layer), a revolutionary approach to infrastructure management that transforms how networks are automated and managed. DIAL provides a unified intelligent API layer for multi-vendor networks, enabling hands-off network automation, full remediation, and near real-time compliance auditing for configuration and security policy.

Gluware DIAL significantly simplifies the automation process for network teams. Instead of writing hundreds of scripts for thousands of devices, DIAL allows users to leverage a unified intent-based data model with intuitive drag-and-drop navigation. This groundbreaking approach enables flawless network automation, dramatically reducing the time required to automate networks while accelerating network transformation.

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How do Gluware’s GenAI-powered Co-Pilots and platform enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of network operations in healthcare and IT/OT environments, and what specific outcomes have you observed from their implementation?

Gluware’s GenAI-powered Co-Pilots are reimagining network operations and NetDevOps across all environments. The Co-Pilots provide a conversational interface that allows network administrators to perform tasks such as discovering network devices, updating device attributes, and automating remediation workflows through natural language interactions. This significantly simplifies network management and reduces the need for manual command line interface operations. For example, this can be used to auto-remediate Splunk alerts and propagate evolving network designs within minutes.

For developers, the AI Co-Pilot assists in writing code and generating JSON structures for configuration modeling and audits. This streamlines the development process and integrates seamlessly with other parts of the Gluware platform.

While our GenAI-powered Co-Pilots will help accelerate self-operating networks as they mature, self-operating networks are alive and thriving today. This is exemplified by our work with the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center (OSUWMC), which was showcased in our keynote address on the main stage at ONUG Fall ’24, which is the premier open networking and AI conference in our industry.

As highlighted in our keynote and OSUWMC case study, healthcare enterprises can accelerate aggressive deployment schedules with limited human resources. Gluware has enabled self-operating networks by automating the provisioning of over 30,000 Catalyst switch ports per hospital without human intervention, ensuring HIPAA compliance, and enabling advanced security features like Dot1x, TrustSec/Zero-Trust, and auto-remediation of Splunk alerts.

As a result, Gluware’s self-operating network automation is helping to enhance patient care and streamline hospital operations for leading healthcare enterprises. This is achieved by minimizing network downtime and accelerating the deployment of critical medical systems across complex healthcare IT infrastructure.

The efficiency gains with Gluware are substantial. For example, in Gluware’s healthcare deployments, it takes just 5 minutes to automate each Cisco 9300 stack – completely hands-free. Stack OS upgrades are completed in 1 hour with 0% defects, a significant improvement over traditional methods.

What aspects of your work do you consider truly disruptive, and how do they challenge the status quo in your industry?

Gluware DIAL is the Gluware IP that adapts and binds infrastructure elements (routers, switches, firewalls, etc.) to the logging and event management layer. It’s a key, disruptive ingredient in our core technology, and it enables hands-off network automation, full remediation, and near real-time compliance auditing for configuration and security policy. We see it as a quantum leap in network automation.

Additionally, our Network RPA (Robotic Process Automation) is a game-changer for the industry, and it provides the ability to create, manage, and monitor no-code process automation through a drag-and-drop interface. It allows users, including network engineers and operators, to create, manage, and run end-to-end process automation for workflows such as moves/adds/changes/ deletes (MACD), assessments, troubleshooting, operating system change processes, configuration management, and other end-to-end processes. Network RPA provides users with access to pre-built task-level operations from the Gluware application suite, along with external tasks for integrations with systems such as ITSMs, IPAMs, monitoring, and Syslog.

Gluware’s auto-remediation of Splunk alerts is also disrupting the status quo because it fundamentally transforms network management and security operations. By automating responses to network events and configuration issues, it significantly reduces manual intervention, minimizes errors, and dramatically improves response times. This integration enables real-time configuration management at scale, allowing organizations to proactively address potential problems before they escalate. This shift from reactive to proactive network management represents a major jump in operational efficiency and network reliability.

Furthermore, our out-of-the-box, self-operating, and auto-remediating platform handles millions of network changes across multi-vendor, multi-domain environments simultaneously, flawlessly, and in minutes. Gluware is the only turnkey, intelligent network automation software platform for NetOps and NetDevOps that automates enterprise networks in as little as 30 days. This is truly disruptive when you compare it to the alternative.

By working closely with our customers, we’ve seen the impact of our automation capabilities firsthand. The results speak for themselves: a remarkable 50x reduction in time and cost compared to manual processes, a transformative 95% reduction in network outages, and OS upgrades performed 300 times faster than traditional methods. In terms of security, we ensure 100% compliance with network security policies.

What are some of today’s top security concerns and threats that plague the minds of IT heads?

Today’s IT leaders are grappling with an expanding array of security concerns and threats, particularly as networks become increasingly complex due to AI and cloud adoption, digital transformation, and the integration of multi-vendor and multi-domain environments.

Patching the latest security vulnerabilities remains the number one way to reduce security exposures. However, the scale and complexity of modern networks make traditional patching methods challenging and time-consuming. Gluware addresses this critical concern by offering intelligent network automation that facilitates patching at scale, significantly reducing security exposures across the enterprise in near real-time. By leveraging our intelligent network automation for patching, IT leaders can significantly reduce the time and resources required for this critical security task, while also minimizing the window of vulnerability for their networks and network downtime. Operational disruptions resulting from network downtime can cost enterprises an average of $843,360 per hour, with large enterprises facing costs of up to $1.4 million per hour, according to recent industry research by EMA, so this is vital to get right.  

Another critical concern for IT leaders is the need for rapid response to network issues detected through monitoring tools like Splunk. Traditional manual remediation processes can be time-consuming and error-prone, potentially leading to extended periods of network vulnerability or downtime. Gluware addresses this challenge by offering the ability to auto-remediate Splunk alerts. When Splunk ingests network device syslog messages and generates an alert, it can trigger a Gluware automated workflow. This workflow can perform actions such as executing a configuration drift check and, if necessary, implement configuration remediation. By automating this process, organizations can significantly reduce their mean time to respond to network issues, minimize errors in the remediation process, and ensure a consistent approach to problem-solving across the network infrastructure.

Compliance challenges are also prevalent, as evolving regulations demand constant vigilance from already stretched-thin IT and network teams. To address this, Gluware enables automated network configuration changes, OS upgrades at scale, and recurring audit and compliance checks with remediation capabilities. This automation ensures consistent policy enforcement across multi-vendor, multi-domain network environments. The platform allows organizations to easily define and implement company policies, ad-hoc policies, and standards-based policies (like NIST, CIS, and DISA STIG) for network configurations.

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What are the current trends in data security that enterprises should be aware of?

Intelligent Network Automation: As networks become increasingly complex, intelligent network automation is emerging as a critical trend for data security. Gluware’s approach focuses on automating network operations to enhance security posture, reduce configuration errors, and ensure compliance. This trend is particularly important for enterprises managing multi-vendor environments where manual configuration can lead to security vulnerabilities.

Continuous Compliance Monitoring, Detection, and Remediation: With evolving regulatory requirements, enterprises need to keep a close eye on their network configurations to confirm they remain in compliance. Gluware emphasizes the importance of real-time auditing and configuration drift detection to ensure ongoing compliance. By doing this, enterprises can quickly detect and remediate issues before they become security concerns.

AI-Driven Threat Detection and Auto-Remediation: The use of AI in identifying and responding to security threats is becoming increasingly prevalent. Gluware’s GenAI-powered Co-Pilot for Network Operators provides a conversational interface that allows network administrators to analyze network patterns, detect anomalies, and automate remediation for potential security incidents through natural language interactions. Gluware can also auto-remediate Splunk alerts, which significantly reduces mean time to respond to network issues.

A fresh tip on cybersecurity that you would like to give to our readers.

“Intelligent network automation is critical to powering next level cybersecurity and network resilience.” Every second of network downtime poses risks to security and disrupts innovation. Rather than simply reacting to outages, organizations should focus on proactive strategies, investing in technology that detects and remediates issues before they arise.

What are your predictions for 2025 in the cybersecurity domain?

As we approach 2025, the cybersecurity landscape is poised for a paradigm shift, driven by the escalating sophistication of threats and the critical need to protect increasingly interconnected digital ecosystems. The industry is moving towards a future where network resilience, proactive defense, and AI-driven approaches are not just advantageous but essential. Here are the key trends that will shape cybersecurity in 2025, reflecting a transition to more intelligent, integrated, and anticipatory security measures across all critical systems.

• Increased Investment in Resilient Infrastructure: Critical infrastructure failures have become intolerable and businesses will continue to prioritize investments in resilient, secure systems. Rather than being in a mode of constant reaction, enterprises will invest more resources in preventing failures before they occur. The alternative approach has become unsustainable and enterprises realize that this is only going to compound over time. This proactive approach will significantly reduce network downtime and improve network security, enhancing innovation and restoring public trust.
• Industry-Wide Accountability and Standards: The industry will begin to adopt stricter accountability measures and higher standards for infrastructure resiliency. Organizations will no longer tolerate frequent outages and will work collectively to eliminate disruptions. This shift will involve reallocating resources to prioritize infrastructure stability, leading to a more reliable and trustworthy network environment for everyone.
• Proactive AI-Driven Security: AI systems will enhance real-time monitoring, enabling IT leaders to better detect and mitigate threats before they cause harm. Expect AI-driven threat detection to become more predictive, stopping incidents at their earliest stages.
• Accelerated Zero-Trust Adoption: As organizations increasingly embrace zero trust principles, micro and macro-segmentation deployments will see rapid acceleration in 2025. The need for granular access control and dynamic segmentation will drive enterprises to leverage zero-trust networking capabilities. This shift will enable organizations to implement identity-based policies across their entire network infrastructure, significantly enhancing security posture and reducing the attack surface.

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Please tag a cybersecurity leader or researcher you would like to get featured on the cybertech Top Voice interview series.

• Stephen J. White
• Frank Fanzilli
• Tony Farinacci

Thank you Jeff for sharing your insights with CyberTech Insights! We look forward to having you again.

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