Oracle VM
Oracle VM is a next-generation server virtualization and management solution that makes enterprise applications easier to deploy, manage, and support. Oracle VM fully supports both Oracle and non-Oracle applications, and delivers more efficient performance. Oracle VM Templates deliver rapid software deployment and eliminate installation and configuration costs by providing pre-installed and pre-configured software images. Oracle is the only software vendor to combine the benefits of server clustering and server virtualization technologies, delivering integrated clustering, virtualization, storage, and management for grid computing.
Senior Manager, Oracle VM
Location: Redwood Shores, CA
Product: Oracle VM
Q:What's innovative about the project you're working on now?
A:I'm involved in the planning for Oracle VM and in bigger strategies around integrating that product with the other Oracle applications. We're doing a lot of cool work using open source hypervisors (virtualization software) and extending them so that they are better able to deal with a huge number of virtual machines. It enables a whole new architecture. Our vision for the future is a green data center where, instead of having certain servers that are idle most of the time, a lot of different applications are consolidated into one server. Parts of the data center can be powered on and off as the workload dictates.
Q:What innovative technology are you excited about right now?
A:The area that I'm working in now: server virtualization. This is the next wave of computing. We're able to put these virtualization environments on top of the computing resources that companies already have in order to consolidate resources and manage power and workloads more efficiently. It's critical that we do this if we're going to move forward. The environment is too complex now. If data is going to move faster, we have to stop dealing with bare hardware and start dealing with a managed piece of hardware. That's what virtualization allows us to do.
Q:How do you define innovation?
A:It's difficult in the software world today because so many things have been done already. We tend to cobble things together. So to be an innovator, you have to see the linkages between the components in a new way. You have to be able to take a different look at the way a piece of technology is working. You have to find a new approach to the same problems. You're rarely looking for the best algorithm to do a certain type of operation—that exists already. We're always looking for new paradigms and ways of connecting pieces that already exist. That's how we have to look at it going forward.
Q:What is the enemy of innovation?
A:Inertia: taking the current course of action and letting it continue due to fear or organizational requirements. You have to figure out a way of seeing the things that are changing and find a way to manage them before they are out of your control. We see that today. That's why virtualization is so popular. There would have been an endless supply of servers and hardware, but you'll run out of space or power or the ability to manage it all, so you need to simplify. The status quo doesn't work. You have to be willing to take some risks and try out new ideas.
Q:How do you think Oracle's innovative culture benefits our customers?
A:At Oracle, we know that we will always face competition. If we don't make the decision to change, we'll get locked into old ideas and get passed by. So our company keeps changing and finding completely new ways of doing things. Sometimes that means reinventing old products. What our customers get out of that is that we're always on the leading edge of performance.
Q:Who in world history do you think of as innovative?
A:The most inspirational people from a computer science perspective were the Allied code crackers in World War II because they were under tremendous pressure. They were doing something that was all about the mental process and working through logical problems. The ability to do that under that kind of pressure was just phenomenal. Their work, especially Turing's, laid the foundation for everything we do in computer science today.
| 
