For almost exactly a year, I had the privilege of being a blogger for this site, Online Storage Optimization. It was one of the most fulfilling collaborations of my professional life.
When I heard the news yesterday that Dell would be acquiring Ocarina Networks, my first reaction was pride. I couldn’t help but give myself an inner “high five” for having recognized what a great company Ocarina is and would become. My second was to congratulate Dell on their smart choice. I was lucky enough to have worked with the people at Ocarina, and now a whole new group of folks will have this opportunity.
The people at Ocarina Networks are not run-of-the-mill. They are not even above average. They are extraordinary. Anyone who wants to understand what makes a technology company excel would do well to study them. As I wrote in my final, farewell post, Murli Thirumale, CEO of Ocarina is about as far from the image of the typical start-up CEO as you can get. He is soft spoken, thoughtful, and a good listener.
He built his company around a well thought out business philosophy. He first identifies a problem or need, and then designs a product in response to it. In this case, the problem he identified was the proliferation of data worldwide. Rather than go for the obvious, he brought together a team to research the problem and solve it in a new way. This approach is rare. Most of the time, you have start-ups that try to launch based on a technology they themselves developed–in other words, their own pet project. It takes discipline to go about things the way that Murli does.
Murli also showed himself to be a leader in the true sense. Rather than feed his own ego, he chose to surround himself with giants of the storage industry, and he allowed them to get the job done the way they saw fit. Carter George, VP Products, is one of those people. I am particularly indebted to Carter. He was truly a mentor to me. Despite the intense demands of his role at Ocarina, he always had time to answer my questions. He never treated me as anyone other than an equal. I also got to know Goutham Rao, the visionary genius who is the company’s CTO. In addition, I met Dave Withers, who is the man behind the company’s multiple partnerships with top storage companies. For the last few months of my tenure, I worked closely to ramp up the social media program with Mike Davis, director of marketing. Dell is extremely fortunate. They are acquiring technology, but to me the real gift is that they get to work with these remarkable people.
As the headline says, this to me seems like the beginning for Ocarina. It is a bold plan to take the vision of end-to-end dedupe and make it real. This is the next step for the storage industry–and a crucial one if storage costs are to be kept in line, and infrastructure is to keep up with the demands of the real world. We are living in a time when data growth is spiraling upward at rates that no one could’ve imagined even a decade ago. This is the time for a cohesive, meaningful response to this reality. I couldn’t imagine a better outcome for Ocarina, Dell, and the industry as a whole. I am honored to have been a small part of it.
