At a recent HP storage event, Milan Shetti, vice president and CTO for the HP Storage business unit, said that the real innovation in storage is coming from mathematical and algorithmic breakthroughs and developments.
This human factor means that true innovation in the field is within grasp of start-ups and smaller players, as well as the giants, affecting how companies much approach work in the area.
However, Shetti also said that emerging technologies such as memristors will be disruptive in the market. He said it was too early to say whether the current market leaders will remain so when memristor and other non-volatile media (NVM) technologies become available.
As early as 2008, HP labs had done significant work to prove the concept of memristor technologies, and in her Discover speech in Barcelona in 2013, CEO Meg Whitman made specific mention of memristors and photonics as key new technologies that would change computing as we know it.
Shetti confirmed that it would be a few years yet before memristor technologies are widely available, with issues yet to be resolved around both raw materials and manufacture. However, he did say that HP platforms were already prepared for NVM and ready to take advantage, providing a future proofing element that other vendors were not as yet.
Speaking to TechPro, Shetti elaborated on the point of mathematics and algorithms providing the primary source of innovation in storage currently.
Shetti said that as this area of development was based purely around talent and human intelligence, it has meant that the company has had to re-organise itself to compete.
“Yes, we did re-organise,” he confirmed, “to have many start-ups in the company.”
Shetti said that as this change had meant that nimble start-ups and smaller companies were able to innovate in this area, HP had to think like a start-up. This meant allowing small, agile teams to work in deep cooperation and in a very focused manner.
However, traditional methods of assessment were not applicable, forcing other changes too.
“My team does not have product delivery responsibility,” said Shetti. “Their responsibility is to refine algorithms and create news ones. But what they get measured on is how much of their IP made it into the product. They do not ship to customers directly. That has been fantastic.”
This contribution measure, said Shetti, has meant that the work of the team, innovating in algorithms, can still have a direct influence on what is packaged and sent to the end user.
StoreOnce came from internally developed intellectual property (IP), he said.
However, the company is not too single-minded about where the IP comes from, said Shetti. He said that if someone outside does it better externally, then it will also be considered.
Supporting this new style of innovation and development, said Shetti, has been both the CEO and David Scott, senior vice president, Storage Division, Enterprise Group, HP.
Shetti said that Whitman and Scott have fostered a venture capital style of pitching for funding for projects and research that has been instrumental in supporting innovation.
“I don’t remember a time that I’ve gone to Meg or David and said that I needed money to work on a project, and not got something. 100% of the time I’ve gone to them, I’ve been funded,” said Shetti.
Whitman understands the value of innovation, said Shetti, while Scott understands the power of mathematics and algorithms in the area.
“Our innovation DNA has been restored by Meg Whitman,” Shetti asserts.
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