2015-2016 SNIA Board and Technical Council Election - Candidate Profiles and Ballot

Attention SNIA Voting Member Company Representatives -

Below, please find the candidate information and a Ballot for the 2015-2016 SNIA Board of Directors and Technical Council (TC) Elections. It is important that we have your vote and endorsement of these Candidates as they will be playing a key role in the leadership of this organization and the storage networking industry.

The Board of Directors (Board) is the governing body of SNIA. It is composed of 10 Directors elected by the membership, and 3 Directors–at–Large appointed by the Board. For the 2016 Board, 5 elected Directors remain on the Board to complete the second year of their terms. Therefore, 5 seats are open for election to 2–year terms by SNIA voting members and there are 6 Candidates for theses seats. Also, 2 seats remain open for At–Large appointments by the full Board (after elections).

The Technical Council (TC) is the body of technical experts that guides the technical direction of the SNIA. It is typically composed of 7 members elected by the membership and 2 members nominated by the Technical Council and appointed by the Board of Directors. For the 2015 term, 6 voting members were determined as elected and one seat was filled by appointment for terms through 2016. For the 2016 TC election, 7 of the existing TC members (6 elected and 1 appointed) may remain on the TC to complete the second year of their terms. This leaves 1 seat open for election to a 2–year term by SNIA voting members and there are 3 Candidates for these seats; 1 seat remains open for appointment by the full Board (after elections).

Find information on each of the Board of Director and Technical Council candidates below.

To vote (confidentially), complete and e-mail this - BALLOT and forward via e-mail to leo.leger@snia.org.

The deadline for submission of a ballot is midnight PACIFIC TIME, September 30, 2015.

Thank You - your support of the SNIA is appreciated.

Candidates for Board of Directors

Wayne M. Adams

Voting Member Company: EMC Corporation
Title: Senior Technologist
Length of Employment with Current Company: 18 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 35+
Education: BS, dual major Computer Science and Math
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Wayne’s SNIA involvement started in 2002. For the past 12 years, I have served on the SNIA Board of Directors; 6 of those years as Chair, 2 of those years as Treasurer; 4 of those years as Chairman Emeritus, and 10 years as HR Director. I am involved in Green, SMI-S, Strategic Alliances, and numerous strategic board projects. I have been involved in a number of board task forces for Events, Budgets, Intellectual Property, Strategy, Open Source and Software, China, Alliances. I also drive special business contracts to further enable SNIA business such as the KMIP Conformance Program and the CDMI Conformance Program. In 2002-04, I served as chair of the Conferences Committee. During the same time-period, I served on the SNW Board. In 2010- 2013, I rejoined the SNW Governing Board. I also participate in many SNIA international outreach efforts; I have made trips with SNIA Board delegations and participated in recent SNW/Storage conferences in China, Japan, and Europe. For recent Alliances related work, for Green Storage Initiative, relationships are in place for EPA, TheGreenGrid, 80Plus, ITI, and SPEC. When SNIA and SNW were in-place, relationships with IDG, Computerworld, China ComputerWorld, and Angel Business Communications were managed. Strategic relationships with key SNIA service providers are in place including Kavi, MHTB, Ogilvy, and Hanson Bridget.

Employment History

1997-present, EMC Corporation, www.emc.com
Corporate Office of the CTO: direct consortia and industry standards strategy
Global Alliances: direct ISV API program
Product Management: direct product roadmap for SRM, IO Pathing, SAN Management, and manage industry Fibre Alliance consortia
1984-1997, Digital Equipment Corporation
Business Development and Technical Marketing for OEM products, manufacturing industry plant floor control and device management solutions, and oil & gas retail & distribution solutions.
1981-1984, Eastman Kodak
System Designer: design system, implement and maintain solution for real-time plant floor control systems and for automated QA systems.

Industry Achievement Awards

• On behalf of SNIA,  acted as spokesperson, featured keynote and press conferences as well as social media and web TV
• SNIA recognized volunteer awards for F/I work such as Green, XAM, Cloud and Committee work including Conferences and SNW.
• Instrument Society of America, Best Conference Paper , on the topic of plant-floor networks
• Harvey Communication award for the most effective technology ad campaign appearing in both business (Fortune/Forbes/Businessweek) and technical magazines.
• Secured best of show product award for a newly released single board computer
• Keynoted several conferences addressing standards-based computer technologies in manufacturing industries. 
• Authored several trade conference papers and trade magazine articles.
• Numerous EMC and Digital Equipment employee recognition awards for business and industry impact.
• IDG Enterprise Management World inaugural launch
• DMTF, recognized for years of service for Board of Directors and several committees

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

I desire to lead and shape the storage networking industry by continuing SNIA’s importance to the entire IT industry.  I plan to continue to drive key SNIA Board projects including new areas of SNIA focus such as Solid State, KMIP Test Program, SNIA Emerald Program , cross-industry alliances and relationships including  EPA, TheGreenGrid, USITO, industry analysts, and several others to advance data management, green storage, and security as SNIA pillars.  Also to ensure SNIA global execution takes place and is uniform within boundaries of SNIA’s available resources in key geographies. 

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

JTC 1 WG 10, focus on Internet of Things , member
JTC 1 WG 9, focus on Big Data, member
Industrial Internet Consortia (IIC) , several committees including reference architecture, security, and test beds.
Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), committees for standards, service level agreement, and privacy level agreement
DMTF: various committees for CIM, process, Redfish
W3C: primary rep and Advisory Council
TheGreenGrid: monitor technical committee and manage SNIA-TGG alliance
ANSI: consortia interest group and ITS 39 (Green) and DAPS 38 (part of INCITS)
Manage EMC resources for ISO JTC1 ANSI representation and INCITS Exec Board
Direct EMC Standards Program Office for involvement and alignment with IIC, CSA, ANSI, TGG, OMG, and INCITS.

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

SNIA Board of Directors and key committees of the board including Alliances, International, Executive Committee, Standards, Industry Events Strategy. Continued linkages from Board to F/I areas of interest including Green, SMI-S, SSSI. Complete intellectual property work for revised IP Policy and a new Contributors License Agreement.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

Can devote 35%  of work time to SNIA. Can leverage additional EMC company resources to support/drive SNIA initiatives and technical work.  I believe my efforts since 2002 have made a difference for the SNIA including: SNIA presence and recognition beyond the storage industry and key industry alliances. 

Biography

Wayne M. Adams is a Senior Technologist and Director of Standards within the Corporate Office of the CTO at EMC and is responsible for expanding and managing EMC technology initiatives with the industry standards bodies and consortia. Wayne has proudly served on the SNIA Board of Directors since 2003 including roles as Chairman, Chairman Emeritus, and Treasurer during these timespan. He has served in a number of leadership roles for special taskforces, forums and initiatives, conferences, and strategic alliances.

Wayne is active across several industry associations including JTC1, INCITS, W3C, Industrial Internet Consortia, Cloud Security Alliance, DMTF, and TheGreenGrid. Within EMC, previous director positions include partner management and software product management, Prior to EMC, Wayne was responsible for business development of several strategic software and hardware products at Digital Equipment Corporation.

He started his high-tech career at Eastman Kodak as a system designer of real-time control systems. Wayne holds a Bachelor of Science degree with a dual major in Computer Science and Mathematics from the University of Pittsburgh.

Wayne recognizes the industry is never at a standstill and the field of computing continues to become more pervasive and interconnected in every part of business. The lines of personal life and enterprise computing have blurred whereby the internet of things will provide new opportunities for us individually, our employers, as well as SNIA.

David Dale

Voting Member Company: NetApp
Title: Director Industry Standards
Length of Employment with Current Company: 15 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 30+
Education: BSc Applied Physics, University College London
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Active SNIA member since 2000
Member SNIA Board (since 2006); vice chair & Executive Committee 2012/13;
Chairman & Executive Committee 2014/2015
Chair Global Steering Committee
Chair Marketing Steering Committee

Former Chair Ethernet Storage Forum (since 2003-2011)
Former member Data Management Forum governing board
Former Member Solid State Storage Initiative Governing Board
Former Chair Strategic Alliances Committee
Former member SNW Governing Board & agenda committee

Employment History

David Dale is Director of Industry Standards at NetApp, where he is responsible for identifying the standards activities that are important to NetApp and its customers, driving NetApp’s standards participation, and representing NetApp in industry associations and at industry events.

With extensive experience in the computer industry, he is a knowledgeable and valuable technology resource for customers, peers, and the media.  He is a highly regarded presenter and technology evangelist.  He serves on the Board of Directors of the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), the Board of Directors of the DMTF, and is a former Board member of the Ethernet Alliance.

Prior to NetApp, he was director of Strategic Marketing at Avid Technology for 5 years. Prior to Avid, he was senior technical consultant at Data General, where he was involved in the conception and launch of new product initiatives, ranging from Unix multiprocessors, to open systems storage, to high volume servers, to Internet and storage appliances.

Industry Achievement Awards

No official awards, but…

• Recognized presenter, panelist, article author and blogger on storage industry topics.
• SNIA tutorial presenter since 2003

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

I strongly believe that SNIA has a vital role to play in the Storage Networking market, and I believe I have a good track record of working co-operatively in this kind of environment, getting results, and eloquently representing the industry.

Since 2007 I have tried to bring my extensive experience, commitment and energy to the definition and execution of the Board’s agenda. I believe I have established a reputation as an active, pragmatic and trustworthy member of the leadership team. I would like to build on this investment, continuing to dedicate a significant portion to my time to the SNIA, helping shape the organization’s agenda, providing leadership, representing the organization around the world, and working hard to make the organization successful.

Over the past eight years I have significantly broadened and deepened NetApp’s involvement in SNIA TWGs, Forums and Initiatives.

Representation on the SNIA Board is an important sign that NetApp is committed to the organization.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

I currently have contact with most of the industry associations relevant to the storage industry in my role as NetApp’s Director of Industry Standards, with responsibility for the company’s investment profile, budget and participation goals. 

In addition I am an active participant in the DMTF, the OpenStack Foundation, OASIS, and the Linux Foundation.

Biography

David Dale is Director Industry Standards at NetApp, where he is responsible for identifying the standards activities that are important to NetApp and its customers, driving NetApp’s standards participation, and representing NetApp in industry associations and at industry events.

With extensive experience in the computer industry, he is a knowledgeable and valuable technology resource for customers, peers, and the media. He is a highly regarded presenter and technology evangelist. Besides serving on the SNIA Board of Directors, he represents NetApp on the governing Board of the DMTF and on the governing Board of the Open Virtualization Alliance – a Collaborative Project in the Linux Foundation.

He received a bachelor of science degree in Applied Physics from University College London.

Erik Eyberg

Voting Member Company: IBM
Title: Director of Business Development for IBM Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure
Length of Employment with Current Company: 3 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 10+
Education: Electrical Engineer, University of Texas
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Erik Eyberg runs worldwide strategy and business development for enterprise storage within the IBM Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure division. In addition to his leadership responsibilities, Erik speaks at conferences and engages key customers, partners, and analysts. He is a key thought leader contributing to IBM's technical and business strategy across the full Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure portfolio, with a particular focus on IBM's market-leading FlashSystem all-flash array, XIV capacity-optimized disk products, and DS8000 series high-end integrated storage solutions.

Employment History

Erik joined IBM through the acquisition of flash storage pioneer Texas Memory Systems (TMS). As the Director of Business Development at TMS, he led the end-to-end process of evaluating strategic alternatives for the company, ultimately culminating in the successful sale of the company to IBM. Prior to that, he served in a variety of technical and nontechnical leadership roles at TMS. He also spent a decade running his own IT services business. Erik received an electrical engineering degree from The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.

Industry Achievement Awards

N/A

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

As a key strategist within IBM, I both want to make sure we reflect where the industry is going, as well as contribute to driving that.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

N/A

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

N/A

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

N/A

Biography

Erik Eyberg runs worldwide strategy and business development for enterprise storage within the IBM Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure division. In addition to his leadership responsibilities, Erik speaks at conferences and engages key customers, partners, and analysts. He is a key thought leader contributing to IBM's technical and business strategy across the full Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure portfolio, with a particular focus on IBM's market-leading FlashSystem all-flash array, XIV capacity-optimized disk products, and DS8000 series high-end integrated storage solutions.

Erik joined IBM through the acquisition of flash storage pioneer Texas Memory Systems (TMS). As the Director of Business Development at TMS, he led the end-to-end process of evaluating strategic alternatives for the company, ultimately culminating in the successful sale of the company to IBM. Prior to that, he served in a variety of technical and nontechnical leadership roles at TMS. He also spent a decade running his own IT services business. Erik received an electrical engineering degree from The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.

Jim Pappas

Voting Member Company: Intel Corporation
Title: Director of Technology Initiatives
Length of Employment with Current Company: 21 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 33 years
Education: BSEE Electrical Engineering, Computer Systems Engineering, University of Massachusetts/Amherst
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Active member of SNIA serving as Intel Corporation’s representative on the SNIA Board of Directors, and also the SNIA Executive Committee as the organization’s Secretary.   As Intel’s director of technology initiatives, I am very engaged with Intel’s broad participation across a large number of industry organizations, and as such, I am able to focus significant Intel resources toward the advancement of SNIA’s programs.

In 2012, I had the honor of proposing the formation of a new SNIA Technical Working Group (NVM Programming TWG) that has since become one of the most important new developments inside of SNIA, and across the industry.

I have devoted significant time, energy, and resources to enhance SNIA’s impact and success, and I have an impeccable personal history of driving programs for SNIA.

Employment History

1994 – Present:  Intel Corporation

• 2000 – 2015: Director of Technology Initiatives (Enterprise) – responsible for overall corporate participation in several industry organizations. Traditional focus being I/O technologies, storage interfaces, solid state drives, HPC clustering, system management, virtualization, and power management.
• 2000 – 2013: Responsible for the executive and technical management of the companies comprising the server IHV ecosystem. Major functional areas include: Solid State Storage (SSDs & SSD Controllers), Storage (DAS & SAN), Graphics, Local Area Networks, InfiniBand clustering, Ethernet Clustering, PCIe infrastructure silicon.
• 1997 – 2000: Director of Technology Initiatives (Consumer) – Responsible for >20 new technologies for client computers including USB, 1394, PCI, AGP Gfx, ACPI power management, PC ease of use, DVD optical drives, computer graphics, DVI, IAPC, etc.
• 1994 – 1997: Director of Universal Serial Bus – Overall responsibility for spec and product development, as well as creating a robust ecosystem of USB peripherals by the PC industry.

1981 – 1994:  Digital Equipment Corporation

• 1991 – 1994: Director of I/O responsible for creation of the PCI Bus industry standard: Worked as a founding director of the PCI Special Interest Group (PCI SIG) to invent the new bus standard, and drive industry wide adoption of PCI
• 1991 – 1994: Managed the product marketing of Digital’s PCI Si products including: Ethernet, Graphics, Multimedia, and PCI Bridge silicon products
• 1988 -1991: Engineering manager responsible for the development of Digital’s highest volume ever CPU chip (SOC)
• 1981 – 1988: Engineer, graphics architect, lead chip designer, and engineering manager of a number of graphics chips for Digital’s workstation products

Industry Achievement Awards

• Eight US patents in the area of computer graphics
• Intel Achievement Award (Intel’s highest award) for PCI Express
• Broad industry recognition as a speaker for breakthrough technologies
• Frequent keynote speaker at industry events, or executive seminars
• Invited to “ring the bell” for both the NYSE and NASDAQ

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

I personally believe that the advancement of Non Volatile Memory (NVM), and its integration into computer systems is the single largest change to computer architecture since development of the microprocessor. We can readily see the affect of NVM on mobile and client machines in terms of SSDs, but still, the architectural impact is just beginning to emerge. The next advancement of this technology will be the convergence of both storage and memory into a single element in modern computer systems. As a result, I have decided to focus a majority of my personal time, plus that of my organization on NVM.

It is my belief that this technology is so important that an industry consortium must manage the specification development. I have been leading Intel in bringing this technology to SNIA (vs. a variety of other options) because of my trust in the integrity of the SNIA organization, and its technical ability to fairly and effectively manage its adoption.

I will continue to ensure that Intel effectively supports SNIA through TWG and TC technical contributions, marketing participation in the solid-state initiative(s), and management functions via the SNIA board.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

I have a “career long” history of managing dozens of industry organizations, and I have a reputation for driving these fairly, effectively, and always working to ensure success of each organization.   Some of those I am most proud of include:

• PCI Special Interest Group:  Founding director who effectively managed the organization’s technology through ubiquitous industry adoption
• USB Special Interest Group: Founding chairman overseeing all aspects of the industry wide development and deployment of the technology into virtually all modern computer systems
• The Green Grid:  Founding director, developing technology, and policy (both government and social) tackling the enormous problems of energy consumptions of data centers

Organizations that I currently manage include:

• SSD Form Factor Working Group (Chair):  An organizational consortium formed to define a new PCI Express standard physical interface for SSDs, supporting SATA 3.0, SAS 3.0, Multi-lane SAS, and for the first time, adding PCI Express 3.0.   This work is being contributed to SFF-8639.
• InfiniBand Trade Association: (co-chair) An organization that owns the development of specifications for InfiniBand clustering technology
• Open Fabrics Alliance (OFA):  I manage (direct staff) the chairman of OFA, an organization responsible for the development of the OFED stack, which is the key software implementation for InfiniBand, RoCE, and iWarp clustering.
• SSI: I manage (direct staff) the chairman of SSI, an organization that defines a number of “system specifications” across a number of server technologies.
• Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF):  I oversee Intel’s involvement in the DMTF, with particular interest in the Scalable Platform Management Forum (SPMF) which is responsible for the Redfish speciation.   I also serve as Intel’s alternate Board of Directors representative for the DMTF organization.

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

My primary interest is in the area of non-volatile memory for the reasons that I mentioned in the “motivation” section above.   I will continue to attend all Board of Director functions and Executive Committee meetings as a top priority.  I will continue to lead Intel into contributing its leadership architecture in the area of NVM software architecture for consideration by SNIA’s NVM Programming TWG, and then help drive collaborative industry development via the Solid State Storage Initiative (SSSI) organization.

Furthermore, I will continue to represent all of Intel’s involvement in SNIA, expanding our contributions beyond my personal interest of NVM.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

Intel has a long history of designing products with standard interfaces, and leading the industry in the development of those standards.   Intel will continue to invest in NVM technology, and drive new NVM usages into modern computer architecture.   We believe that the industry is best served when standards are developed, and when individual companies design products supporting those standards.  As demonstrated, Intel is willing and eager to help SNIA be the organization that defines the future of the convergence of storage and memory into a single entity.

Within my role in Intel, I have enough influence, and direct staff to ensure that Intel provides a broad range of contribution to the organization.   Intel will continue to contribute several technical resources to properly resource any proposals that we bring forward, or to those that we feel we can contribute.  We will also continue to assign staff to the initiatives (ex: SSSI) in both marketing and engineering capacities.

I am personally very excited to be a member of the SNIA board, and I will continue to devote a significant portion of my time to the success of SNIA if I am re-elected.  I have been doing this type of work long enough to have significant autonomy on which projects I undertake… and NVM is the primary area where I choose to focus my efforts.

Biography

Jim Pappas is the Director of Technology Initiatives in Intel’s Data Center Group. In this role, Jim is responsible to establish broad industry ecosystems that comply with new technologies in the areas of Enterprise I/O, Energy Efficient Computing, and Solid State Storage. Jim has founded, or served on several organizations in these areas including: PCI Special Interest Group, Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), InfiniBand Trade Association (IBTA), Open Fabrics Alliance (OFA), The Green Grid, Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) and several emerging initiatives in his newest focus area of Solid State Storage.

Mr. Pappas has previously been the Director of Technology Initiatives in Intel’s Desktop Products Group, and successfully led technologies such as AGP Graphics, DVD, IEEE 1394, Instantly Available PC, PCI, USB, and other advanced technologies for the Desktop PC.

Mr. Pappas has over 33 years of experience in the computer industry. He has been granted eight U.S. patents in the areas of computer graphics and microprocessor technologies. He has spoken at dozens of major industry events and holds a B.S.E.E. from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts.

Thomas Rivera

Voting Member Company: Hitachi Data Systems
Title: Sr. Technical Associate
Length of Employment with Current Company: 4 Years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience:30 years
Education: A.S., Business Management & Publishing Technology, Rochester Institute of Technology (Rochester, NY)
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Thomas has been active in the SNIA since 2008, participating in the Data Deduplication & Space Reduction Special Interest Group (DDSR SIG), under the SNIA’s Data Management Forum (DMF). Once the DMF ceased to exist, one of my fellow SNIA colleagues (Mike Dutch) and I felt that we were still doing relevant work within the DDSR, so we petitioned the SNIA Board for forming a Committee, which we did. The SNIA Board accepted the proposal, and the Data Protection & Capacity Optimization (DPCO) Committee was publicly announced in January of 2010. Thomas has also contributed to the Education Committee, in the form of teaching Certification/Qualification Prep courses, and well as presenting many Tutorials over the years. Thomas also serves as the Data Management & Data Protection Tutorial Track Chair for the Education Committee, in addition to being a member of the Analytics & Big Data Committee, as well as the Security TWG. Thomas has has also been serving on the Board, as an appointed board member, since October of last year (2014).

Employment History

Thomas has worked for multiple Storage vendors over the years, including Auspex, Intransa, MTI, Xyratex SANRAD, SEPATON, BlueArc and currently working for Hitachi Data Systems. Storage specialties include Data Protection, Data Management, and storage security.

Industry Achievement Awards

Thomas received the “DPCO Outstanding Leadership” award in 2010, as well as the “SNIA Unsung Hero ” Award in 2012. Thomas has also received numerous “Outstanding Speaker” awards over the years, for SNIA Tutorials that he presented.

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

I would like to continue to contribute as a Board member in the areas of Data Protection, Data Management and Security, as well as the Analytics & Big Data Committee, and making sure that the thoughts and directions of my company are well-represented in the appropriate storage standards. In addition, I am interested in assisting with the strategic direction of the SNIA, including marketing outreach and emerging areas such as Software Defined Storage & Object Drive Storage.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

I am currently involved as voting member with two the of the US-based INCITS groups: Internet of Things (“IoT10”), and “Big Data”.

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

Interested in continuing my work with the DPCO Committee and the Security TWG, as well as the Analytics & Big Data Committee. In addition, I am interested in assisting with the strategic direction of the SNIA, including marketing outreach and emerging areas such as Software Defined Storage & Object Drive Storage.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

Thomas is married to his beautiful wife (Lolita), and blessed with three talented daughters, and grandparents to two adorable grandchildren.

Biography

Thomas Rivera has over 30 years of experience in the storage industry, specializing in file services and data protection, and is a Senior Technology Associate with Hitachi Data Systems (HDS). Thomas is also an active member of the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), participating as co-chair of the Data Protection & Capacity Optimization (DPCO) Committee, and is also a member of the Analytics & Big Data Committee, as well as the Storage Security Technical Working Group (TWG).

Prior to joining HDS, Thomas held various technical development, technical sales support, and management roles with various storage vendors, including Auspex, Intransa, MTI, Xyratex, Sanrad, Sepaton, and BlueArc.

Thomas earned his degree in Business Management and Publishing Technology from the Rochester Institute of Technology, in Rochester, NY.

Jim Williams

Voting Member Company: Oracle Corporation
Title: Product Manager for Oracle Automatic Storage Management
Length of Employment with Current Company: 15 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 32 years
Education: BS Computer Science 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

I have been an active member of SNIA since 1999. My contributions include:

1. Served on SNIA’s Technical Council.
2. Developed and delivered Flash Storage class at “Hands on Lab”.
3. Presented at Storage Developers Conferences.
4. Founded and chaired Data Integrity Working Group.

Employment History

Since summer of 2000, I have been at Oracle in the capacity of Product Development and Product Management for Oracle’s principal storage management feature called Automatic Storage Management. Previous employment before Oracle, I had worked for 17 years at Amdahl Corporation in the role of product architecture for their storage product offerings.

Industry Achievement Awards

Three storage related patents related to my development role at Oracle.

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

With respect to the enterprise, the storage industry is at several crossroads regarding storage technology evolution. The evolution of solid state-based storage, widespread commercialization of public cloud computing, and the acceptance of Software Defined Storage stands to have profound impact on our industry. SNIA facilitates customers, and the industry as a whole, through its membership with talent and vested interests that help with bring these changes to fruition. As a board member, I would bring both experience and excitement for assisting SNIA’s membership as the industry embraces these fundamental changes. 

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

N/A

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

Key areas of interests include:                        

1. Evolution of storage in the Enterprise vis-a-vis sold-state storage
2. Evolution of public Cloud Computing
3. Software Defined Storage

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

Previously held Oracle seat on INCITS T10 committee.

Biography

Jim Williams is Senior Principle Product Manager for Oracle Corporation. A 37-year industry veteran focusing on management software for large-scale data and storage systems. In the summer of 2000, Jim was one of the founding development team members for Automatic Storage Management, bringing the vision of ASM to fruition. He is currently the ASM Product Manager and his storage industry background helps make this product the preferred storage management for Oracle databases worldwide. Specific areas of contribution include methods of storage access optimization, achieving end-to-end data integrity, and strategies for integrating Oracle’s storage management stack in customer’s environments.
 
Jim was an early SNIA member and believer in the value and opportunity that SNIA brings to SNIA members and the storage industry as a whole. He has served on SNIA’s Technical Council, presented at their Storage Developers Conferences, led hands-on lab workshops, founder and chair of the Data Integrity Working Group. As a board member, he would bring both experience and excitement for assisting SNIA’s membership as the industry embraces fundamental changes including sold-state storage in the Enterprise, Software Defined Storage, and Cloud Computing.

Prior experiences include the role of product architecture in Amdahl’s storage product group. His most recent responsibly at Amdahl was directing and advising on the intersection between storage management and enterprise-class storage array products. Jim’s career at Amdahl spanned 17 years beginning in the early 80’s and included working in their mainframe development.

Jim has a Bachelor of Science in computer science from Arizona State University and had worked towards a Masters of Electrical Engineering at both Arizona State and Santa Clara University.

Candidates for Technical Council

Bill Martin

Voting Member Company: Samsung SSI
Title: SSD I/O Standards
Length of Employment with Current Company: 3 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 20 years
Education: BSEE/CS University of California Davis
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Chair Technical Council, Vice-Chair Technical Council, Chair Recognition Program Task Force, Chair Data Integrity TWG.

Participant in: Object Drive TWG, Standards Committee, SSSI, NVMP TWG, Solid State Storage TWG, S4 TWG, Cold Storage Tack Force, Open Source Task Force, Data Recovery and Erase SIG, SDC Agenda Team, PCIe SSD Committee, and SSS Performance & Benchmarking subgroup

Employment History

2013 – Present Samsung - SSD I/O standards
2004 – 2012: Emulex - Engineer Consultant Storage Industry Standards
2002 – 2004: Brocade – Sr. Principal Engineer Storage Industry Standards and Interoperability
1997 – 2002: Gadzoox – Sr. Principal Engineer Storage Industry Standards
1980 – 1997: HP – Member Technical Staff (Storage Industry Standards 1993 – 1997)

Industry Achievement Awards

2013 - INCITS Merit Award

InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS)

INCITS recognition for numerous contributions to the Fibre Channel standards community. As one of the principal architects of the Fibre Channel technology, you have held leadership, technical, and marketing roles that help helped ensure the success of the Fibre Channel industry. Through your tireless contributions, the Fibre Channel technologies have become the cornerstone of the multi-billion dollar Storage Networking industry. In addition to the development of the technical and interoperability aspects of Fibre Channel, you have served in various officer capacities at the committee level, including INCITS/T11.3 Vice Chairman and INCITS/T11 Secretary.

2010 FCIA Achievement Award

Fibre Channel Industry Association
In recognition and appreciation for efforts in developing and advancing the technical standards and market adoption of Fibre Channel.

2007 - INCITS Outstanding Leadership Team Award

InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS) Honorary award presented to a team of participants who have provided outstanding service to the INCITS organization through committee work. Outstanding teamwork in rapidly progressing the subgroup's national and international activities; demonstrated skill in developing technically sound standards.

2005 -INCITS Technical Excellence Award

InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS) Honorary award presented to recognize technical contributions and dedication to the technical program of work. This award is presented with the concurrence of the TC officers for contributions to the work of the TC.

2005 - FCIA Lifetime Achievement Award

Fibre Channel Industry Association

Lifetime achievement for developing Fibre Channel standards and interoperability

2004 - Outstanding Theme Lead for the Interop Lab

Storage Networking Industry Association

SNIA award for outstanding Theme Lead for the Interop Lab at Storage Networking World Spring 2004

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

I have been involved in leadership roles in the Storage Industry since 1993. Currently I am participating in a large number of SNIA TWGs, Committees, Task Forces, SIGs, and Initiatives where I hope to continue to lead SNIA as a leader in the storage industry. In my current role leading standards activities for Samsung Solid State Storage and Memory devices, I would like to continue to help direct the technical work of SNIA as the industry continues moving into the high performance area of solid state storage, including Non-Volatile Memory and Object Drives, as they are used in cloud storage, and analytics and big data; and the impacts of storage security in these evolving technologies.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

INCITS T10 – Vice Chair, editor of SBC-4;
INCITS T13 – Secretary;
NVMe – Contributing member;
SATA-IO – Contributing member;
SCSI Trade Association – participating member.

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

Solid State Storage – ALL areas;
            Object Drive
            NVMp
            S3 TWG
            S4 TWG
            Performance
            Data Recovery and Erase SIG
            PCIe SSD Committee, and
            SSS Performance & Benchmarking subgroup
Standards Committee;
SDC Agenda Team;
Storage Security; and
Cold Storage Tack Force;
Open Source Task Force; and

Analytics and Big Data.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

I have a wealth of past experience in the Storage Industry that I will contribute to the future directions of the SNIA.

Biography

William Martin is responsible for driving Solid State Storage forward within the industry for Samsung, currently representing Samsung SSD products in a variety of standards and marketing arenas. William is currently chair of the SNIA TC, chair of the SNIA recognition task force, and has served as SNIA chair of the Data Integrity TWG. He serves on the SNIA Standards Committee, the Solid State Storage Initiative and several technical work groups in the Solid State Storage area including: the Object Drive TWG, NVMp TWG, Data Recovery and Erase SIG and others.

William also is Vice Chair of the INCITS T10, SCSI Storage Interfaces Technical Committee, Secretary of the INCITS T13, AT Attachment Technical Committee, and editor of SCSI Block Commands – 4 (SBC-4). He has submitted numerous proposals for standardization of advanced features for solid state storage in SNIA, T10, T13, and NVMe. Previous positions within the storage community include Vice Chair of INCITS T11.3, Fibre Channel Interconnection Schemes, Secretary INCITS T11, Fibre Channel Interfaces Technical Committee, and various editor positions within the Fibre Channel Standards community. William has led Fibre Channel interoperability events for over 17 years, and participated in the SNIA interoperability lab in the early 2000’s.

William has received numerous industry recognitions for his contributions to the storage industry over the past decade including: INCITS Merit award 2013, FCIA Achievement award 2010, INCITS Outstanding Leadership Team award 2007, INCITS Technical Excellence award 2005, FCIA Lifetime Achievement award 2005, and SNIA Outstanding Theme lead for the interop lab 2004.

He has been involved in the storage industry for 30 years, starting in 1983 with the development of a proprietary optical storage interface for HP, architecting the HP Tachyon interface chip for Fibre Channel, serving on industry consortiums and standards bodies for storage including SNIA, INCITS T11, INCITS T10, INCITS T13, SATA-IO, and NVMe for HP, Gadzoox Networks, Brocade, Sierra Logic, Emulex, and Samsung. William holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering/Computer Science from the University of California, Davis.

Carlos Pratt

Voting Member Company: IBM
Title: Infrastructure Architect
Length of Employment with Current Company: 16 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 22 years
Education: Electronic Systems Engineering, Computer Sciences minor from ITESM (Mexico)
 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

Active member of the GSI-TWG since 2008
Co-chair of the Green TWG since 2013.
Member of the GSI governing board since 2013.
Actively helped on Energy Star training.
Actively working on cooperation with the EPA and providing tools design for the emerald program
Helping with the cold storage task force
As part of the TC:
Wrote a white paper on SDS.
Have participated on software contributions from IBM helping ease the process internally in IBM
Participated on the SDC committee and I am planning to continue participating

Currently getting involved with the DSI committee

Employment History

Mexico:
1989-1991 ITESM-Teacher assistant
1991-1992 Tres Estrellas de Oro (Network technical support)
1992-1996 Ernst & Young consulting (last position: Senior Consultant IT strategies)

USA:

1996-1999 Modular Mining systems (last position: Development lead for GPS based data acquisition of heavy mining equipment)
1999-Present: IBM last position: Infrastructure Architect. This position is focused on data centers supporting cloud with a focus on:

1. Cost
2. Performance
3. Energy aware (be as green as possible)
4. Customer experience

Industry Achievement Awards

2011 - Recognition for work on the development of Emerald

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

The first two years were a deep dive to understand how the TC works and its involvement in SDC and DSI. Thinking forward my work here related to Cloud, Cold Storage and conferences is just beginning and I wish to continue so I can increase my level of contribution. Additionally being on the council I can help SNIA to identify new trends and technologies that may cause new, interesting and productive shifts in the market. This last can help SNIA to position itself as a focal point of industry collaboration and if needed advisor to regulating agencies

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

Green Grid: Working with their storage metrics group
SPC: As backup of IBM’s representative and helped with the latest SPC-1/E and SPC-2/E specifications and initial measurements

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

Energy Efficiency and storage, to find new and innovative ways to mix the best performance with the minimum use of electricity.
Cloud: Although cloud is not new, the technologies applied today are. Finding ways to make the cloud more available to the end consumer with high performance and in a more friendly interactive way is something SNIA can help with. I am very interested on participating
Interoperability: this is an area by many treated as an obvious one and by very few treated as a key area for all vendors to talk to each other. Other than SMI, I believe that there is much more to be done in this area, especially the area of interoperability with hosts and pure software instances (Hardware Agnostic as some define) SNIA can be a key player on this area
Infrastructure: It is an area that many industry associations have tried to tackle from a single point of view, SNIA is in a unique position to help BLEND and recommend best practices for all the different infrastructure building blocks from the data center to the connectivity of the equipment. This is a very broad area that SNIA could help to tackle.
Cold Storage: An old storage issue with a new name. It is an interesting area where SNIA can help to combine different efficiencies on a standardize way from power off the rack to configure it so the first time to data accessed on the cold storage (warm up) is not painfully slow in the perception of the user.
Conferences: I have always found that sharing knowledge is also the best way of gaining adepts. Helping SNIA to organize SDC and SDI is at minimum a moral obligation for someone like me to help these to be each year more successful than the previous.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

Although I expect to be able to attend all the TC meetings, My travel could be limited by IBM budget cuts.

Biography

Carlos Pratt has a degree on electronic and systems engineering from ITESM (Mexico). He has worked in the Digital Storage industry since 1995. After Joining IBM in 1999, Carlos worked on several software projects related to specific IBM storage components from tape, virtual tape libraries and disk arrays. In 2000 Carlos joined the IBM disk test organization to help with the function and performance evaluation of the fiber channel connectivity between storage and different types of servers. Since 2005 Carlos has been part of the hardware systems storage performance organization. His main role in this organization was to provide architecture guidance for the design of several IBM storage products. In special situations he helps IBM with customer’s complex storage technical situations. Carlos led the energy efficiency design efforts for IBM storage from 2007 to 2015. Currently Carlos has being asked to join the IBM Cloud team as an infrastructure architect. Carlos is an active participant of several areas in SNIA and the Green Grid.

Among some of the published white papers related to storage performance/energy he is coauthor of the storage chapter of the Book 12 of ASHRAE Datacom Series: Server Efficiency--Metrics for Computer Servers and Storage

HengLiang Zhang

Voting Member Company: Huawei Technologies
Title: Standard Department Vice Director, IT ProductLine
Length of Employment with Current Company: 20 years
Years of Storage Industry / IT Community Experience: 6 years
Education: Computer Software Bachelor, DaLian University of Science and Technology 

Previous SNIA Service (Technical Working Groups, Forums, Initiatives, Committees, Board, TC, Task Forces, Projects)

1. Currently serve as SNIA Object Drive co-chair.
2. Currently participate S4 TWG standard activities, trying to leverage Huawei storage product to participate S4 dataplugfest test
3. Previously participated SMI Lab 15 (was SMI lab 14) activities. In 2013 , as the contact from Huawei , hosted the first multi-side SMI-s plugfest test. That was also the first time for SMI-s plugfest test to be hosted outside US
4. Get the reward of Outstanding Contributor of SNIA 2013.

Employment History

Joined Huawei technologies in 1995, till now.

Industry Achievement Awards

Worked for Huawei about 20 years, Served as programmer, project manager, system architect, vice director of research department.
Start telecom standard career in 2005, worked for 3GPP SA2 as project rappoetour, 3GPP SA2 IMS vice chair. Also worked for CCSA (china telecomm standard association) as TC1 vice group leader.
Start participating IT Cloud/Storage standard activities from 2009. Hosted DMTF CMWG meeting in Dallas in 2011.
Get CCSA science and Technology Progress Award 2012.

Your Motivation for Seeking This Seat

To contribute in the interested technical areas, e.g. Object Drive, S4, Server SAN etc. Also hope to build a good communication bridge between SNIA and Huawei storage, and China storage standard industry.

Other Associations That You Are Currently Active With and In What Capacity

• Currently Serve as project leader of storage virtualization group in Data Center Alliance (China), has active connection with China IT standard industry for both IT compute and storage area.
• Currently Participate INCITS T10 standard activities, especially in ZBC and CAP work progress.
• Currently has good connection with NFV IFA WG since worked for NFV in 2015 as NFV IFA004 rapporetour.
• Always has good connection with telecomm Core Network standard industry , e.g. 3GPP, CCSA, etc.

Potential Areas of Interest (Marketing, Work Groups, Standards, Interoperability, End User Council, Other)

Interested in Object drive, Server SAN, solid state performance test, hope could make contribution in this areas.

Anything Else the SNIA Should Be Aware Of

N/A

Biography

• Over 20 years’ knowledge and experience in Telecomm Core Network and IT compute/storage areas.  Knowledged telecomm IMS expert in telecomm standard industry (both in 3GPP and CCSA).  Knowledged storage expert in Data Center Alliance(China).
• Over 7 years background on telecommunication standard industry, familiar with 3GPP SA2 (architect) IMS specifications and work procedure.  Over 16 years background on telecommunication industry, familiar with the architect design and some modules implementation for IMS products, SoftSwitch product.
• About 6 years background on IT related standard industry, familiar with the DMTF ,INCITS T10 specifications and work procedures.
• Good understanding of IP network, is familiar with basic IP process and DCB related specifications.