In just a few short years since its initial release, the Kubernetes system for container orchestration in virtualized computing environments has seen rapid industry adoption, all contributing to transformations in the enterprise. With the latest release of Pivotal Container Service 1.1, or PKS — a streamlined Kubernetes management platform from Pivotal in partnership with Google Cloud Platform and VMware Inc. — the system is making a home for itself in the enterprise.

“We’ve moved past the early hype cycle and actually went through several hype cycles that blew up,” said Chad Sakac (pictured), who handles PKS and the Dell Technology alliance at Pivotal Software Inc., on Kubernetes’ enduring position in the industry. Sakac is the driving force behind PKS at Pivotal, where he works to simplify the system and streamline integrations both internally and for customers.

Sakac spoke with Stu Miniman (@stu), host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, at the Cloud Foundry Summit in Boston, Massachusetts. They discussed the issues PKS 1.1 is designed to resolve and the impediments some businesses working with Kubernetes face at the micro level. (* Disclosure below.)

‘These journeys are not in a straight line’

Emerging from a competitive hype cycle as the standard container cluster manager for broad sets of workloads, Kubernetes stands to vastly improve enterprise compute — with some optimization by Pivotal and its partners. “This is my focus for the next few years; how do we make Kubernetes simple enough … and enterprise ready. … A lot of Kubernetes projects that our customers have are … difficult to sustain,” Sakac said.

The newest release of PKS aims to incorporate lessons learned over the years at Cloud Foundry into Kubernetes and work toward an integration of the two that Sakac calls inevitable. “I am determined and stubborn and will make PKS the best enterprise platform for customers that are putting workloads on Kubernetes,” he said.

At Pivotal, part of creating the best enterprise platform is teaching customers how to best use it. Sakac leverages years of field observation and customer dialogues to hone the Kubernetes platform. “The Pivotal obsession is about the customer and the outcome. We build a platform that is an essential part of that, but teaching the world how to build better software is a noble mission,” he said.

Pivotal’s recent initial public offering is inaugurating yet another shift within an organization that has experienced significant changes over the past few years. From Sakac’s point of view, the biggest adjustments within the company will take place on the Kubernetes front.

“The strategic change … to … Kubernetes versus the traditional opinionated versus plastic debates, I wouldn’t say that we have 100 percent of the company fully embracing it yet,” he said.

Despite some pushback, Sakac is confident the company will ultimately see the platform’s utility. “Across the majority of the company it is understood that it is an imperative for us. … These journeys are not in a straight line,” he concluded.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Cloud Foundry Summit. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the Cloud Foundry Summit. Neither the Cloud Foundry Foundation, the event sponsor, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE