Changing Times for Linux Networx

By Michael Feldman

September 8, 2006

Linux Networx has enjoyed record revenue growth over the last several quarters. In Q2, the company enjoyed its fifth consecutive record quarter in a row. Over the last six years, Linux Networx has refined its HPC offerings and grown its customer base to the point where it is now considered one of the premier supercomputer vendors. But some changes are afoot.
 
In the past few weeks HPCwire learned that the company had started to do some internal realignment. There were rumors that as many as 60 workers had been laid off. At the same time, they were looking to expand other parts of the workforce. Subsequently we learned that a rather large amount of venture capital money was heading its way. In an exclusive interview, Linux Networx CEO Robert “Bo” Ewald tells HPCwire what prompted these changes and what it means for the future of the company.

HPCwire: Can you talk about some of the changes we have been hearing about at Linux Networx?

Ewald: We've continued to evolve our strategy to help our customers solve important computing problems with our leading Linux supercomputing systems, software and services. The first phase of that strategy started in Q4 of 2005 when we delivered our LS Series of Linux Supercomputers, our family of standard, validated supercomputing configurations. The second phase focused on providing additional products and services to enhance the core compute capabilities of our LS Series. We initiated this phase earlier this year with the delivery of our storage products — in Q1 — and visualization solutions — in Q2 — as performance-integrated components of a complete supercomputing system. We are now moving into the third phase of our strategic roadmap. We will be emphasizing software designed to bring clustered Linux supercomputers to production quality levels historically provided by proprietary and Unix based systems.

As we move through these phases, we have continually aligned the company with both our long and short term objectives. Since we've moved to a standard system approach, we no longer design each and every system as a unique effort. As a result we need fewer hardware engineers and manufacturing people in the company. We will need, however, more software engineers to execute the next phases of our strategy. In addition, we are expanding our sales force and service organizations to better cover the expanding industrial customers who use our systems.

In recognition of the traction that we are getting as a business, and in anticipation of our ability to continue to grow the company, we are also pleased that we have just closed a $37 million financing deal for the company.

This financing was composed of both our current investors, principally Oak Investment Partners and Tudor Ventures, and new investors including Lehman Brothers and Canaccord Adams.
 
HPCwire: After the record growth you have achieved over the past year and a half, why did you decide to make these changes at this point?
 
Ewald: Actually we are seeking to accelerate our growth in both the traditional supercomputing market as well as the growing industrial base. Given the company's heritage of building custom systems, we probably have more experience with different hardware and software combinations than any other company in the market. So, we've watched the trends, the product roadmaps — what works well and what doesn't — and developed our LS Series of systems. We are now accelerating our development efforts to do take a similar approach on the Linux Supercomputing software side, namely we will complement our hardware products with Linux based software to attack the key problems that we hear over and over from our customers. These customers need Linux to have the production ready characteristics that were developed over the last 25 years, initially for proprietary operating systems and then later for proprietary Unix systems.

HPCwire: Would you characterize these changes as evolutionary or revolutionary for the company?

Ewald: Clearly evolutionary since we are building on the base of supercomputing knowledge already within the company, as well as insights gained from our customers and partners. Clustered systems can provide great price/performance advantages, but we need to evolve the software environment, the diagnostic tools and the service tools so that they match up to the quality and sophistication required by the industrial/production customers.
 
HPCwire: Will these changes result in any new products or services this year? Next year?

Ewald: Yes, as we move through the next year, you'll see us refresh the LS Series as new technologies are available from our partners and suppliers. And on the software side, you'll see new software introduced from us in three major areas:

  1. Performance and utilization tools for both individual applications and system level.
  2. System usability and management to enable Linux supercomputing clusters to be used and managed more easily.
  3. Reliability, availability and serviceability to bring tools like remote diagnosis, patch management, high availability, etc. to Linux Supercomputing. 

HPCwire: Do you think these changes will make you stronger in any specific vertical markets?

Ewald: We think that they'll help strengthen us across the board, and should enable customers and industries that are relatively new to Linux and clustered systems to accelerate their move to successfully leverage Linux supercomputing systems in production environments.
 
HPCwire: Are these changes a reflection of the way the HPC market is changing?
 
Ewald: Yes, we are moving past the pioneering phase of adoption of clustered Linux architectures into a stronger production Linux Supercomputing environment. We want to help accelerate that trend.

HPCwire: Is there anything else you'd like to add?

Ewald: The financing that we've just completed is another key milestone in the company's growth. It demonstrates both the confidence and support of our ongoing investors, principally Oak Investment Partners and Tudor Ventures, and a new investor — Lehman Brothers, a major global banking business. We are equally excited about moving our business ahead!

Subscribe to HPCwire's Weekly Update!

Be the most informed person in the room! Stay ahead of the tech trends with industry updates delivered to you every week!

MLPerf Inference 4.0 Results Showcase GenAI; Nvidia Still Dominates

March 28, 2024

There were no startling surprises in the latest MLPerf Inference benchmark (4.0) results released yesterday. Two new workloads — Llama 2 and Stable Diffusion XL — were added to the benchmark suite as MLPerf continues Read more…

Q&A with Nvidia’s Chief of DGX Systems on the DGX-GB200 Rack-scale System

March 27, 2024

Pictures of Nvidia's new flagship mega-server, the DGX GB200, on the GTC show floor got favorable reactions on social media for the sheer amount of computing power it brings to artificial intelligence.  Nvidia's DGX Read more…

Call for Participation in Workshop on Potential NSF CISE Quantum Initiative

March 26, 2024

Editor’s Note: Next month there will be a workshop to discuss what a quantum initiative led by NSF’s Computer, Information Science and Engineering (CISE) directorate could entail. The details are posted below in a Ca Read more…

Waseda U. Researchers Reports New Quantum Algorithm for Speeding Optimization

March 25, 2024

Optimization problems cover a wide range of applications and are often cited as good candidates for quantum computing. However, the execution time for constrained combinatorial optimization applications on quantum device Read more…

NVLink: Faster Interconnects and Switches to Help Relieve Data Bottlenecks

March 25, 2024

Nvidia’s new Blackwell architecture may have stolen the show this week at the GPU Technology Conference in San Jose, California. But an emerging bottleneck at the network layer threatens to make bigger and brawnier pro Read more…

Who is David Blackwell?

March 22, 2024

During GTC24, co-founder and president of NVIDIA Jensen Huang unveiled the Blackwell GPU. This GPU itself is heavily optimized for AI work, boasting 192GB of HBM3E memory as well as the the ability to train 1 trillion pa Read more…

MLPerf Inference 4.0 Results Showcase GenAI; Nvidia Still Dominates

March 28, 2024

There were no startling surprises in the latest MLPerf Inference benchmark (4.0) results released yesterday. Two new workloads — Llama 2 and Stable Diffusion Read more…

Q&A with Nvidia’s Chief of DGX Systems on the DGX-GB200 Rack-scale System

March 27, 2024

Pictures of Nvidia's new flagship mega-server, the DGX GB200, on the GTC show floor got favorable reactions on social media for the sheer amount of computing po Read more…

NVLink: Faster Interconnects and Switches to Help Relieve Data Bottlenecks

March 25, 2024

Nvidia’s new Blackwell architecture may have stolen the show this week at the GPU Technology Conference in San Jose, California. But an emerging bottleneck at Read more…

Who is David Blackwell?

March 22, 2024

During GTC24, co-founder and president of NVIDIA Jensen Huang unveiled the Blackwell GPU. This GPU itself is heavily optimized for AI work, boasting 192GB of HB Read more…

Nvidia Looks to Accelerate GenAI Adoption with NIM

March 19, 2024

Today at the GPU Technology Conference, Nvidia launched a new offering aimed at helping customers quickly deploy their generative AI applications in a secure, s Read more…

The Generative AI Future Is Now, Nvidia’s Huang Says

March 19, 2024

We are in the early days of a transformative shift in how business gets done thanks to the advent of generative AI, according to Nvidia CEO and cofounder Jensen Read more…

Nvidia’s New Blackwell GPU Can Train AI Models with Trillions of Parameters

March 18, 2024

Nvidia's latest and fastest GPU, codenamed Blackwell, is here and will underpin the company's AI plans this year. The chip offers performance improvements from Read more…

Nvidia Showcases Quantum Cloud, Expanding Quantum Portfolio at GTC24

March 18, 2024

Nvidia’s barrage of quantum news at GTC24 this week includes new products, signature collaborations, and a new Nvidia Quantum Cloud for quantum developers. Wh Read more…

Alibaba Shuts Down its Quantum Computing Effort

November 30, 2023

In case you missed it, China’s e-commerce giant Alibaba has shut down its quantum computing research effort. It’s not entirely clear what drove the change. Read more…

Nvidia H100: Are 550,000 GPUs Enough for This Year?

August 17, 2023

The GPU Squeeze continues to place a premium on Nvidia H100 GPUs. In a recent Financial Times article, Nvidia reports that it expects to ship 550,000 of its lat Read more…

Shutterstock 1285747942

AMD’s Horsepower-packed MI300X GPU Beats Nvidia’s Upcoming H200

December 7, 2023

AMD and Nvidia are locked in an AI performance battle – much like the gaming GPU performance clash the companies have waged for decades. AMD has claimed it Read more…

DoD Takes a Long View of Quantum Computing

December 19, 2023

Given the large sums tied to expensive weapon systems – think $100-million-plus per F-35 fighter – it’s easy to forget the U.S. Department of Defense is a Read more…

Synopsys Eats Ansys: Does HPC Get Indigestion?

February 8, 2024

Recently, it was announced that Synopsys is buying HPC tool developer Ansys. Started in Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1970 as Swanson Analysis Systems, Inc. (SASI) by John Swanson (and eventually renamed), Ansys serves the CAE (Computer Aided Engineering)/multiphysics engineering simulation market. Read more…

Choosing the Right GPU for LLM Inference and Training

December 11, 2023

Accelerating the training and inference processes of deep learning models is crucial for unleashing their true potential and NVIDIA GPUs have emerged as a game- Read more…

Intel’s Server and PC Chip Development Will Blur After 2025

January 15, 2024

Intel's dealing with much more than chip rivals breathing down its neck; it is simultaneously integrating a bevy of new technologies such as chiplets, artificia Read more…

Baidu Exits Quantum, Closely Following Alibaba’s Earlier Move

January 5, 2024

Reuters reported this week that Baidu, China’s giant e-commerce and services provider, is exiting the quantum computing development arena. Reuters reported � Read more…

Leading Solution Providers

Contributors

Comparing NVIDIA A100 and NVIDIA L40S: Which GPU is Ideal for AI and Graphics-Intensive Workloads?

October 30, 2023

With long lead times for the NVIDIA H100 and A100 GPUs, many organizations are looking at the new NVIDIA L40S GPU, which it’s a new GPU optimized for AI and g Read more…

Shutterstock 1179408610

Google Addresses the Mysteries of Its Hypercomputer 

December 28, 2023

When Google launched its Hypercomputer earlier this month (December 2023), the first reaction was, "Say what?" It turns out that the Hypercomputer is Google's t Read more…

AMD MI3000A

How AMD May Get Across the CUDA Moat

October 5, 2023

When discussing GenAI, the term "GPU" almost always enters the conversation and the topic often moves toward performance and access. Interestingly, the word "GPU" is assumed to mean "Nvidia" products. (As an aside, the popular Nvidia hardware used in GenAI are not technically... Read more…

Shutterstock 1606064203

Meta’s Zuckerberg Puts Its AI Future in the Hands of 600,000 GPUs

January 25, 2024

In under two minutes, Meta's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, laid out the company's AI plans, which included a plan to build an artificial intelligence system with the eq Read more…

Google Introduces ‘Hypercomputer’ to Its AI Infrastructure

December 11, 2023

Google ran out of monikers to describe its new AI system released on December 7. Supercomputer perhaps wasn't an apt description, so it settled on Hypercomputer Read more…

China Is All In on a RISC-V Future

January 8, 2024

The state of RISC-V in China was discussed in a recent report released by the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. The report, entitled "E Read more…

Intel Won’t Have a Xeon Max Chip with New Emerald Rapids CPU

December 14, 2023

As expected, Intel officially announced its 5th generation Xeon server chips codenamed Emerald Rapids at an event in New York City, where the focus was really o Read more…

IBM Quantum Summit: Two New QPUs, Upgraded Qiskit, 10-year Roadmap and More

December 4, 2023

IBM kicks off its annual Quantum Summit today and will announce a broad range of advances including its much-anticipated 1121-qubit Condor QPU, a smaller 133-qu Read more…

  • arrow
  • Click Here for More Headlines
  • arrow
HPCwire