Sun Microsystems

Scott McNealy, 52, is chairman of the board of directors of Sun Microsystems, a company he co-founded in 1982 and chairman of Sun Federal Inc. From 1984 to 2006, McNealy served as chief executive officer and chairman at Sun, steering the Company to constant innovation in open, network computing. In... his 22 years at the helm, McNealy grew Sun from a Silicon Valley start-up to a leading provider of network computing infrastructure with 37,900 employees worldwide, all while positioning the Company as the model of corporate integrity. In 1986, he took Sun public, creating one of the most notable publicly traded technology companies. Seeing the impact of the network on security and privacy long ago, McNealy responded by building security into every Sun product. McNealy's vision and business acumen have made him one of the most influential and widely quoted leaders in the complex, fluid and fast-moving IT industry. His leadership and determination have enabled Sun to outpace its peers, to grow while others have collapsed, to leverage market opportunities in good economies and bad, and to claim the leadership mantle as one of the world's great technology companies. McNealy has helped set the industry agenda through his vision of network computing which has served as a guide and barometer for the direction and pace of technology innovation. And, for more than a decade, he has been advancing Sun's slogan, The Network Is The Computer -- a succinct statement of the company's vision of seamless connectivity that is now driving the Participation Age. McNealy never shies away from controversial issues in the industry. His tenacity and willingness to address tough issues head on has earned him respect and admiration. In 1999, McNealy predicted that "software will all go free," and the market is now moving in that direction. He also foresaw the service provider movement, predicted the rise of business models based upon free software, evangelized thin client architectures and predicted grid computing. And, McNealy's belief in innovation and commitment to R&D, even in a tough economic climate, helped Sun weather the storm of the dot.com collapse, leaving the Company well positioned to compete in today's marketplace. A champion of Sun's 24-year old strategy to share, McNealy is always fighting for openness and choice: "Without choice, you have no innovation. Without innovation, you have nothing." In his ongoing role as Chairman of the Board and his role as Chairman of Sun Federal, Inc., McNealy continues to put his leadership and vision to work for Sun. He is a strong advocate for open and competitive business practices and is furthering his commitment to education, working with Curriki, a global education and learning community dedicated to delivering global access to knowledge. McNealy graduated from Harvard in 1976 with a BA in Economics and received an MBA from Stanford in 1980. He is an avid hockey player and a single digit handicap golfer. He is married and is the father of four boys.
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Vinod Khosla was a co-founder of Daisy Systems and founding Chief Executive Officer of Sun Microsystems, where he pioneered open systems and commercial RISC processors. Vinod serves on the boards of Agami, eASIC, Indian School of Business, Infinera, Kovio, Metricstream, Spatial Photonics, Xsigo and... Zettacore.Vinod holds a Bachelor of Technology in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi, a Master's in Biomedical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University, and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.E-mail: vinodk@kpcb.
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Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, Inc. and employee number one, returns to Sun as Chief Architect and Senior Vice President, Network Systems organization and is also a member of Sun's executive management team. In his new role,Bechtolsheim will drive the rapid productization of... next generation network server technologies.Bechtolsheim brings with him over 25 years of Network Computing knowledge and expertise. He was a co-founder of Sun Microsystems where he held a variety of roles including Vice President of Technology and Chief Architect of Sun's highly successful workstation product line. He invented the "Stanford University Network workstation" that eventually became the Sun-1 Workstation and was instrumental in launching other successful Sun products, including the SparcStation 1.Bechtolsheim left Sun in 1995 to found Granite Systems, a Gigabit Ethernet start-up company, that was acquired by Cisco Systems in 1996. Andy became Vice President of Engineering and later Vice President General Manager of Cisco's Gigabit Systems business which developed the Catalyst 4000 family, the industry's highest volume modular Ethernet switching platform.Bechtolsheim returns to Sun via the Kealia, Inc. acquisition, a company which he co-founded to develop advanced server technology.Bechtolsheim received a MS in computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in 1976 and he was a PhD student in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University from1977 to 1982. He has been honored with a Fulbright scholarship, a German National Merit Foundation scholarship, the Stanford Entrepreneur Company of the year award, the Smithsonian Leadership Award for Innovation and is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
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Vaughan Ronald Pratt , a Professor Emeritus at Stanford University, was one of the earliest pioneers in the field of computer science. Publishing since 1969, Pratt has made several contributions to foundational areas such as search algorithms, sorting algorithms, and primality testing. More... recently his research has focused on formal modeling of concurrent systems and Chu spaces. A pattern of applying models from diverse areas of mathematics such as geometry, linear algebra, abstract algebra, and especially mathematical logic to computer science pervades his work. Raised in Australia and educated at Knox Grammar School where he was dux in 1961, Pratt attended Sydney University where he completed his masters thesis in 1970, related to what is now known as natural language processing. He then went to the United States, where he completed a Ph.D. thesis at Stanford University in only 20 months under the supervision of advisor Donald Knuth. His thesis focused on analysis of the shellsort sorting algorithm and sorting networks. Pratt was an Assistant Professor at MIT and then Associate Professor .
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Steve Bennett joined Intuit in January 2000 as the company's president and chief executive officer. Since then, Bennett has combined the company's... historic innovative and customer-driven expertise with strategic and operational rigor. As a result, Intuit revenue grew to more than $2.3 billion in fiscal 2006 from less than $1 billion in fiscal 2000. In addition, operating margins expanded to nearly 28 percent in fiscal 2006 from 17.5 percent in 2000, while operating profits grew to $654 million compared to $172 million over the same period. Intuit has grown under Bennett’s leadership by pursuing a straightforward strategy: Be in growth businesses, high-profit businesses and attractive new markets with large unmet or underserved needs Intuit can solve well. This strategy has led the company’s expansion into new areas that serve larger and more complex businesses, creating solutions that go beyond accounting and tax preparation. This includes Intuit’s emerging presence in online banking and health care, complementing its portfolio of flagship brands – QuickBooks, TurboTax and Quicken software, leaders in the small business, consumer tax preparation and personal finance management fields. Since Bennett’s arrival, Intuit has strengthened its legacy of customer-driven innovation. It has developed an array of “Right for Me” products and services that solve important problems and make it easier for customers to solve nagging, everyday problems. At the same time, Bennett has led the transformation of Intuit’s culture. He has instilled a “True North” mindset, where all employees consistently work to deliver best-we-can-be results for employees, shareholders and customers in the short- and long-term. His focus on increasing employee engagement and creating a high-performing organization has led Intuit to being named to Fortune Magazine’s “Best Companies to Work For” list for six consecutive years and Most Admired Software Company for three years running. Bennett joined Intuit from General Electric Co., where he managed complex and diverse organizations – from consumer appliances to financial services – during a 23-year career. He served as an executive vice president and member of the office of the CEO at GE Capital, the financial services subsidiary of GE. In this position, he oversaw a portfolio of five different companies with more than 20,000 employees. Prior to this appointment, Bennett was president and chief executive officer of GE Capital e-Business. He was also president and chief executive officer of GE Capital Vendor Financial Services, a global leader in providing sales financing for manufacturers and distributors. Bennett is a member of the board of directors of Sun Microsystems, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin with a bachelor’s degree in finance and real estate.
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Scott McNealy, 52, is chairman of the board of directors of Sun Microsystems, a company he co-founded in 1982 and chairman of Sun Federal Inc. From... 1984 to 2006, McNealy served as chief executive officer and chairman at Sun, steering the Company to constant innovation in open, network computing. In his 22 years at the helm, McNealy grew Sun from a Silicon Valley start-up to a leading provider of network computing infrastructure with 37,900 employees worldwide, all while positioning the Company as the model of corporate integrity. In 1986, he took Sun public, creating one of the most notable publicly traded technology companies. Seeing the impact of the network on security and privacy long ago, McNealy responded by building security into every Sun product. McNealy's vision and business acumen have made him one of the most influential and widely quoted leaders in the complex, fluid and fast-moving IT industry. His leadership and determination have enabled Sun to outpace its peers, to grow while others have collapsed, to leverage market opportunities in good economies and bad, and to claim the leadership mantle as one of the world's great technology companies. McNealy has helped set the industry agenda through his vision of network computing which has served as a guide and barometer for the direction and pace of technology innovation. And, for more than a decade, he has been advancing Sun's slogan, The Network Is The Computer -- a succinct statement of the company's vision of seamless connectivity that is now driving the Participation Age. McNealy never shies away from controversial issues in the industry. His tenacity and willingness to address tough issues head on has earned him respect and admiration. In 1999, McNealy predicted that "software will all go free," and the market is now moving in that direction. He also foresaw the service provider movement, predicted the rise of business models based upon free software, evangelized thin client architectures and predicted grid computing. And, McNealy's belief in innovation and commitment to R&D, even in a tough economic climate, helped Sun weather the storm of the dot.com collapse, leaving the Company well positioned to compete in today's marketplace. A champion of Sun's 24-year old strategy to share, McNealy is always fighting for openness and choice: "Without choice, you have no innovation. Without innovation, you have nothing." In his ongoing role as Chairman of the Board and his role as Chairman of Sun Federal, Inc., McNealy continues to put his leadership and vision to work for Sun. He is a strong advocate for open and competitive business practices and is furthering his commitment to education, working with Curriki, a global education and learning community dedicated to delivering global access to knowledge. McNealy graduated from Harvard in 1976 with a BA in Economics and received an MBA from Stanford in 1980. He is an avid hockey player and a single digit handicap golfer. He is married and is the father of four boys.
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Jonathan Schwartz is chief executive officer and president of Sun Microsystems, and a member of Sun's board of directors. He became Sun's CEO in... 2006, succeeding the Company's co-founder and current chairman of the board, Scott McNealy. Schwartz was promoted to president and chief operating officer in 2004, and managed all operational functions at Sun - from product development and marketing, to global sales and service. An inveterate communicator, Schwartz has led Sun's drive to engage the marketplace, and redefine corporate transparency. A leader behind many of Sun's open source and standard setting initiatives, Jonathan's been an outspoken advocate for the network as a utility with more than just value for the computing industry - but as a tool for driving economic, social and political progress. Prior to his position as COO, Schwartz served as Sun's executive vice president for software, its Chief Strategy Officer, and held a variety of leadership positions across product and corporate development. He joined Sun in 1996 after the Company acquired Lighthouse Design, where he was CEO and co-founder. Prior to that, Schwartz was with McKinsey & Co. Schwartz received degrees in economics and mathematics from Wesleyan University.
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