June 11, 2025 • 15 mins
Agentic AI represents the next evolution in artificial intelligence, moving beyond generating content to executing actions autonomously on behalf of users. We explore how this technology differs from generative AI and why enterprise storage professionals need to prepare for its rapid adoption. On June 26, 2025, our SNIA experts will host a live webinar, "Agentic AI - Use Cases, Benefits, Risks," where they will discuss:
• How Agentic AI generates actions, using tools or skills it has at its disposal
• How Agentic AI is accelerating even faster than generative AI, making preparation essential
• Finding appropriate fit-for-purpose use cases for successful and practical implementation
• Real-world applications in action
SNIA is an industry organization that develops global standards and delivers vendor-neutral education on technologies related to data. In these interviews, SNIA experts on data cover a wide range of topics on both established and emerging technologies.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
All right, welcome everybody to the SNEA Experts on
Data podcast.
This is amazing because we'vegot another fantastic webinar
that's coming up.
So this is a webinar previewand I'm super excited because
I'm joined by two of my favoritehumans who are going to talk
today about agentic AI and areally, really cool webinar
(00:28):
which is coming up.
So, first of all, I'll startwith introductions.
So, if you don't mind, give aquick intro where you're at what
you do, and then we'll jumpinto talking about the webinar.
We'll start with you, erin.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Hi.
Yes, I'm Erin Farr and I workfor IBM in the storage CTO
office and that's a strategyrole where we look at industry
trends, disruptive technologieslike agentic, ai and customer
pain points to influence theroadmap of our solutions.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Excellent and Michael , no-transcript, because it
(01:35):
seems like it's so new and yetit's been on the tips of tongues
of CIOs and pundits everywherefor the last little while.
But what I'd love to sort ofstart by framing, Erin, what is
your goal here?
I know we've got this.
The webinar is really the coreof what we're going to talk
about.
But what's exciting you aboutagentic AI and what's your goal
(01:58):
with the webinar that's comingup?
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Sure.
So my goal is to giveenterprise storage personas the
information they need if they'reevaluating agentic AI solutions
.
Right, because there's a lot ofagentic information out there
and it predominantly targetsdevelopers people who are
building agentic AI solutions,but not necessarily those who
(02:22):
are consuming them and what tolook for, but not necessarily
those who are consuming them andwhat to look for.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, this is always the interesting thing too, and
we mentioned, you know, we'vechatted before talking about the
idea of like, who's the targetfor this?
And it's interesting becausewhen we say AI, it's kind of an
everyone's game.
Then we say agentic AI and ittends to lean towards sort of
builders and developers.
But what's funny to me you knowfunny, peculiar, not funny, ha
(02:47):
ha is that we really forgetabout compute, storage,
networking, all of the real sortof pain points that you're
about to discover.
If you think that just agenticAI is the be all, end all and
it's fantastic and what it cando, Let me start with that.
But there's big implicationsthat are further down the stack
(03:12):
and even higher up in the stackas far as what are the goals and
business outcomes?
What are the expected sort oframp times when people are
taking on an agentic AI project?
What is the reality of thematurity of an agentic AI?
So, what is the reality of thematurity of agentic AI?
So there's so much to cover,which is why this is a preview
and people will make sure thatthere's going to be a link below
(03:33):
.
If you haven't already signedup for the webinar?
Please do, and we'll shareexactly sort of details of that
at the end.
But from your side, Michael, onthe SNEA world, how does
agentic AI play into the workthat you've been doing?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Well, great.
So we have had a number ofwebinars this is part of a
series and we've had webinars onAI ops and went into a lot of
detail about how folks prepareand then deploy into IT and
(04:11):
different systems for enterprise.
We've also had SEF, the Linuxof storage, and that was very
fascinating.
A lot of that is being drivenby the scale need for AI and
that was addressed in that talk.
We've also done Kubernetes aseries on that for the fast
(04:35):
moving storage and scale needsthat they have, needs that they
have and especially for managingall of that data.
So, in terms of the Agenic AI,this is a very, very new area
and we're really excited to haveAaron kick this off.
(04:57):
This will also be a series, sowe're looking forward to more of
these.
After the end of June We'llhave our next webinar.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
I think a perfect lead in here, Aaron AI.
And why is this an amazing timeto come in and learn about
what's coming as a result ofthis new sort of wave in?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
the AI world, right, and so yeah, and I plan to go
into deeper detail about what itis in the session as well, but
at a high level.
I'll talk about it in thecontext of generative AI.
Right, with generative AI, alarge language model generates
content as the result of aprompt, a question.
You ask it, right.
But with agentic AI, thelanguage model now generates
actions to execute on yourbehalf or skills, they're
(05:45):
sometimes called, but it doesthese actions using tools or
skills it has at its disposal.
So agentic comes from the factthat it has agency to act on
your behalf and even runautonomously.
And I'll cover a little bit theevolution of how we got there
and what the differences arebetween agentic AI and
generative AI.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
And I'd like to think that this is probably almost a
Gutenberg level of innovation inwhat we've been able to do with
AI, particularly around.
Like you said, this is a focusspecifically on generative AI,
because it was very, you know,having human in the loop was one
thing that's typical in AIconsumption today, but then to
(06:30):
go one step further and to beable to, like, give it long
running tasks and complex tasksand then have it actually figure
out based on roles andcapabilities and now we see
things like the introduction ofMCP and more things around how
do you present and publish whatservices you have available?
(06:52):
This is all happening so fast,but it really is working towards
what I believe is a common,shared goal of the AI industry,
in that how do we collectivelystandardize towards something
that everyone can use andultimately teach machines to
(07:14):
speak to machines with a personon the front and on the back?
So for you, erin, and lookingat the storage, why is this
important to the storagepractitioner and to the storage
architect?
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Well, because it's coming, whether you want it to
or not.
Right?
We thought ChatGPT andgenerative AI were disruptive.
I feel as though this isaccelerating at an even faster
pace than generative was and andbasically you know you will be
faced with it, and so you mightas well prepare yourself, you
(07:51):
know, and maybe get some initial, you know considerations to
think about.
Right, because, on the one hand, it shows great promise, it can
save a lot of work.
On the other hand, it's sotrendy right now that there's a
possibility that some peoplewill create something agentic
(08:13):
that doesn't really need to beagentic.
Right To me, there's this wholechallenge around finding
fit-for-purpose use cases andfinding the right use cases, and
I go into that in great detailin this session too, because it
even took me a while in my roleto find a use case that I
thought was not justfit-for-purpose but also
provided value tries to meetcustomers where they are in
(08:35):
their journey, because, eventhough the hype is about running
autonomously, the reality is.
My belief is that mostenterprise use cases will want a
human in the loop for many oftheir actions, at least to start
until they build that trust,and so it's going to be
interesting to see howenterprises adapt to this, and
(08:58):
my goal is to help peoplenavigate through this disruptive
technology before they're facedwith it.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Well, I think the core, what I love about the
approach that you've got andI've had lucky, I got to preview
some of the slides and see whatcontent is coming, so it's
really great.
Some of the slides and see whatcontent is coming, so it's
really great.
But, most importantly, as aconsumer of this stuff, this is
not meant to be a zero to hero.
This is what I call it hype tohello world.
This is where, like, we hearabout this, but let's see it in
(09:32):
its first form right.
And I think this is such animportant discussion because if
we aren't doing the rightrequirements gathering up front
and the right architecturaldecisions up front, we will pay
for them 100-fold if we don't dothe right things now.
Different than all othercompute before, especially in
(09:55):
storage.
This is it's a it's a wild westworld, but it's.
I'm excited by it.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Definitely.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Now, michael, just as I know we don't want to give it
all away before we get to thewebinar, but if you don't mind,
from your side of the world,then representing SNEA and all
the work you've seen aroundbuilding standards, coming
together as collectivecompetitors, in effect, right,
so, because there'sparticipating vendors in the
community as well as with IETFand IEEE, what is the beauty to
(10:29):
you of what we are now doing asa community to get this
information to the world andshow how we are working?
We're basically building inpublic and as competitive
vendors that are cooperatingwith building in public.
I feel like this is a greatsample of what we want to see
more of and what excites youabout this webinar in particular
(10:52):
, michael.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Yeah, thank you so much for that question.
So we have so many things goingon within SNEA.
There's multiple communities.
Cst is only one of those.
There's a lot of action behindthe scenes that are focused on
AI, and probably what excites memost is just the opportunity to
work with experts in the field,like Aaron, and so there's so
(11:25):
many folks that we're engagedwith, and we'll bring that
information through morewebinars.
And I did wanna say one wordabout what I'm most excited
about.
I don't wanna say too muchabout Erin's content, but she
also has a demo, so this isgoing to be very exciting,
(11:47):
because this really shows thetangible state of the technology
that it's here now, and so thisis something that's real right
now.
And so just the rest of thewebinar, we just want to hold
that for when we get to June 26,10 am Pacific.
(12:09):
So please join us for thewebinar.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Thank you.
If you only see one webinarthis year, you should probably
see more webinars, but this isdefinitely the first one you
should see.
It absolutely is.
You know, real experience beingshared.
This isn't a fireside chat witha bunch of AI people saying how
they think it could go.
I love that you've actuallyreally identified proven, real
(12:36):
market trends and thank you forthat because, again, as somebody
who's always looking for datathat backs the pundit stories,
it's so refreshing to seedata-driven webinars with people
like yourself, Aaron andMichael, who've actually done
the hard yards and are workingthis stuff in production
(12:56):
environments.
So super exciting, Excellent.
Well with that.
So for folks that did want toconnect with you before and even
after the event, Aaron, what'sthe best way that they can reach
you?
Speaker 1 (13:09):
They can connect with me on LinkedIn, for example.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Just search on Erin Farr and you'll find me.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
And Michael.
Of course I'll say they shouldcome to the next Nia SDC event.
Whatever it happens to be, jointhe community, but there's
obviously many other ways toreach you.
What's the best way to get ahold of you?
Speaker 3 (13:31):
Yeah, so LinkedIn is fine, but also we have
askcloudplugfest at sneaorg isprobably the best way to get
involved with our PlugFest andtest tools activities, and I'm
on that chain, um, so that'll begreat.
(13:52):
And you also mentioned uh, sdc,so that's in september.
Uh, that's the 15th through the, uh, I believe the 17th, and uh
, so we have three days ofplugfest going on there.
There's numerous presentationsthat are going on at the same
time, so that's a reallyfantastic event Innovation in
(14:14):
community.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
It just doesn't get better than that, so excellent.
Well, thank you both, and sofor folks, again, make sure you
get signed up.
We'll have links below and makesure to check out sneaorg.
We'll have access to getregistered.
And if, for whatever reason,you're seeing this one and it's
already passed, don't worry,because all the webinars,
including all these greatpodcasts, are also available on
demand.
(14:35):
So, thank you, aaron andMichael, for your time today,
good luck on delivering afantastic webinar and demo, and
I'm looking forward and I'll seeyou all on the live session and
I'll also see you hopefully onsome upcoming SNEA Experts on
Data podcasts.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Thank you.
All right, welcome everybody to the SNEA Experts on
Data podcast.
This is amazing because we'vegot another fantastic webinar
that's coming up.
So this is a webinar previewand I'm super excited because
I'm joined by two of my favoritehumans who are going to talk
today about agentic AI and areally, really cool webinar
(00:28):
which is coming up.
So, first of all, I'll startwith introductions.
So, if you don't mind, give aquick intro where you're at what
you do, and then we'll jumpinto talking about the webinar.
We'll start with you, erin.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Hi.
Yes, I'm Erin Farr and I workfor IBM in the storage CTO
office and that's a strategyrole where we look at industry
trends, disruptive technologieslike agentic, ai and customer
pain points to influence theroadmap of our solutions.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Excellent and Michael , no-transcript, because it
(01:35):
seems like it's so new and yetit's been on the tips of tongues
of CIOs and pundits everywherefor the last little while.
But what I'd love to sort ofstart by framing, Erin, what is
your goal here?
I know we've got this.
The webinar is really the coreof what we're going to talk
about.
But what's exciting you aboutagentic AI and what's your goal
(01:58):
with the webinar that's comingup?
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Sure.
So my goal is to giveenterprise storage personas the
information they need if they'reevaluating agentic AI solutions
.
Right, because there's a lot ofagentic information out there
and it predominantly targetsdevelopers people who are
building agentic AI solutions,but not necessarily those who
(02:22):
are consuming them and what tolook for, but not necessarily
those who are consuming them andwhat to look for.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, this is always the interesting thing too, and
we mentioned, you know, we'vechatted before talking about the
idea of like, who's the targetfor this?
And it's interesting becausewhen we say AI, it's kind of an
everyone's game.
Then we say agentic AI and ittends to lean towards sort of
builders and developers.
But what's funny to me you knowfunny, peculiar, not funny, ha
(02:47):
ha is that we really forgetabout compute, storage,
networking, all of the real sortof pain points that you're
about to discover.
If you think that just agenticAI is the be all, end all and
it's fantastic and what it cando, Let me start with that.
But there's big implicationsthat are further down the stack
(03:12):
and even higher up in the stackas far as what are the goals and
business outcomes?
What are the expected sort oframp times when people are
taking on an agentic AI project?
What is the reality of thematurity of an agentic AI?
So, what is the reality of thematurity of agentic AI?
So there's so much to cover,which is why this is a preview
and people will make sure thatthere's going to be a link below
(03:33):
.
If you haven't already signedup for the webinar?
Please do, and we'll shareexactly sort of details of that
at the end.
But from your side, Michael, onthe SNEA world, how does
agentic AI play into the workthat you've been doing?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Well, great.
So we have had a number ofwebinars this is part of a
series and we've had webinars onAI ops and went into a lot of
detail about how folks prepareand then deploy into IT and
(04:11):
different systems for enterprise.
We've also had SEF, the Linuxof storage, and that was very
fascinating.
A lot of that is being drivenby the scale need for AI and
that was addressed in that talk.
We've also done Kubernetes aseries on that for the fast
(04:35):
moving storage and scale needsthat they have, needs that they
have and especially for managingall of that data.
So, in terms of the Agenic AI,this is a very, very new area
and we're really excited to haveAaron kick this off.
(04:57):
This will also be a series, sowe're looking forward to more of
these.
After the end of June We'llhave our next webinar.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
I think a perfect lead in here, Aaron AI.
And why is this an amazing timeto come in and learn about
what's coming as a result ofthis new sort of wave in?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
the AI world, right, and so yeah, and I plan to go
into deeper detail about what itis in the session as well, but
at a high level.
I'll talk about it in thecontext of generative AI.
Right, with generative AI, alarge language model generates
content as the result of aprompt, a question.
You ask it, right.
But with agentic AI, thelanguage model now generates
actions to execute on yourbehalf or skills, they're
(05:45):
sometimes called, but it doesthese actions using tools or
skills it has at its disposal.
So agentic comes from the factthat it has agency to act on
your behalf and even runautonomously.
And I'll cover a little bit theevolution of how we got there
and what the differences arebetween agentic AI and
generative AI.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
And I'd like to think that this is probably almost a
Gutenberg level of innovation inwhat we've been able to do with
AI, particularly around.
Like you said, this is a focusspecifically on generative AI,
because it was very, you know,having human in the loop was one
thing that's typical in AIconsumption today, but then to
(06:30):
go one step further and to beable to, like, give it long
running tasks and complex tasksand then have it actually figure
out based on roles andcapabilities and now we see
things like the introduction ofMCP and more things around how
do you present and publish whatservices you have available?
(06:52):
This is all happening so fast,but it really is working towards
what I believe is a common,shared goal of the AI industry,
in that how do we collectivelystandardize towards something
that everyone can use andultimately teach machines to
(07:14):
speak to machines with a personon the front and on the back?
So for you, erin, and lookingat the storage, why is this
important to the storagepractitioner and to the storage
architect?
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Well, because it's coming, whether you want it to
or not.
Right?
We thought ChatGPT andgenerative AI were disruptive.
I feel as though this isaccelerating at an even faster
pace than generative was and andbasically you know you will be
faced with it, and so you mightas well prepare yourself, you
(07:51):
know, and maybe get some initial, you know considerations to
think about.
Right, because, on the one hand, it shows great promise, it can
save a lot of work.
On the other hand, it's sotrendy right now that there's a
possibility that some peoplewill create something agentic
(08:13):
that doesn't really need to beagentic.
Right To me, there's this wholechallenge around finding
fit-for-purpose use cases andfinding the right use cases, and
I go into that in great detailin this session too, because it
even took me a while in my roleto find a use case that I
thought was not justfit-for-purpose but also
provided value tries to meetcustomers where they are in
(08:35):
their journey, because, eventhough the hype is about running
autonomously, the reality is.
My belief is that mostenterprise use cases will want a
human in the loop for many oftheir actions, at least to start
until they build that trust,and so it's going to be
interesting to see howenterprises adapt to this, and
(08:58):
my goal is to help peoplenavigate through this disruptive
technology before they're facedwith it.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Well, I think the core, what I love about the
approach that you've got andI've had lucky, I got to preview
some of the slides and see whatcontent is coming, so it's
really great.
Some of the slides and see whatcontent is coming, so it's
really great.
But, most importantly, as aconsumer of this stuff, this is
not meant to be a zero to hero.
This is what I call it hype tohello world.
This is where, like, we hearabout this, but let's see it in
(09:32):
its first form right.
And I think this is such animportant discussion because if
we aren't doing the rightrequirements gathering up front
and the right architecturaldecisions up front, we will pay
for them 100-fold if we don't dothe right things now.
Different than all othercompute before, especially in
(09:55):
storage.
This is it's a it's a wild westworld, but it's.
I'm excited by it.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Definitely.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Now, michael, just as I know we don't want to give it
all away before we get to thewebinar, but if you don't mind,
from your side of the world,then representing SNEA and all
the work you've seen aroundbuilding standards, coming
together as collectivecompetitors, in effect, right,
so, because there'sparticipating vendors in the
community as well as with IETFand IEEE, what is the beauty to
(10:29):
you of what we are now doing asa community to get this
information to the world andshow how we are working?
We're basically building inpublic and as competitive
vendors that are cooperatingwith building in public.
I feel like this is a greatsample of what we want to see
more of and what excites youabout this webinar in particular
(10:52):
, michael.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Yeah, thank you so much for that question.
So we have so many things goingon within SNEA.
There's multiple communities.
Cst is only one of those.
There's a lot of action behindthe scenes that are focused on
AI, and probably what excites memost is just the opportunity to
work with experts in the field,like Aaron, and so there's so
(11:25):
many folks that we're engagedwith, and we'll bring that
information through morewebinars.
And I did wanna say one wordabout what I'm most excited
about.
I don't wanna say too muchabout Erin's content, but she
also has a demo, so this isgoing to be very exciting,
(11:47):
because this really shows thetangible state of the technology
that it's here now, and so thisis something that's real right
now.
And so just the rest of thewebinar, we just want to hold
that for when we get to June 26,10 am Pacific.
(12:09):
So please join us for thewebinar.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Thank you.
If you only see one webinarthis year, you should probably
see more webinars, but this isdefinitely the first one you
should see.
It absolutely is.
You know, real experience beingshared.
This isn't a fireside chat witha bunch of AI people saying how
they think it could go.
I love that you've actuallyreally identified proven, real
(12:36):
market trends and thank you forthat because, again, as somebody
who's always looking for datathat backs the pundit stories,
it's so refreshing to seedata-driven webinars with people
like yourself, Aaron andMichael, who've actually done
the hard yards and are workingthis stuff in production
(12:56):
environments.
So super exciting, Excellent.
Well with that.
So for folks that did want toconnect with you before and even
after the event, Aaron, what'sthe best way that they can reach
you?
Speaker 1 (13:09):
They can connect with me on LinkedIn, for example.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Just search on Erin Farr and you'll find me.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
And Michael.
Of course I'll say they shouldcome to the next Nia SDC event.
Whatever it happens to be, jointhe community, but there's
obviously many other ways toreach you.
What's the best way to get ahold of you?
Speaker 3 (13:31):
Yeah, so LinkedIn is fine, but also we have
askcloudplugfest at sneaorg isprobably the best way to get
involved with our PlugFest andtest tools activities, and I'm
on that chain, um, so that'll begreat.
(13:52):
And you also mentioned uh, sdc,so that's in september.
Uh, that's the 15th through the, uh, I believe the 17th, and uh
, so we have three days ofplugfest going on there.
There's numerous presentationsthat are going on at the same
time, so that's a reallyfantastic event Innovation in
(14:14):
community.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
It just doesn't get better than that, so excellent.
Well, thank you both, and sofor folks, again, make sure you
get signed up.
We'll have links below and makesure to check out sneaorg.
We'll have access to getregistered.
And if, for whatever reason,you're seeing this one and it's
already passed, don't worry,because all the webinars,
including all these greatpodcasts, are also available on
demand.
(14:35):
So, thank you, aaron andMichael, for your time today,
good luck on delivering afantastic webinar and demo, and
I'm looking forward and I'll seeyou all on the live session and
I'll also see you hopefully onsome upcoming SNEA Experts on
Data podcasts.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Thank you.
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