Is working at Apple the end of the career for a data center executive?

Sometimes I wonder if Olivier Sanche would still be alive if he had stayed at eBay instead of going to Apple.  If Olivier was still at eBay he would most likely be the VP that replaces Mazen Raswashdeh vacant position as eBay's VP of Technical Operations.  But, Olivier had a passion for Apple products including the dream to work there.  I spent 7 years working at Apple from 1985 - 1992 during the good years of early Macintosh Development, yet I never think should I have stayed at Apple.  I have friends who are still there with 25+ years, and some have left and gone back

What would have happened if I had stayed at Apple all these years.  Well, I would have hit 26 years at Apple this year and still be living in the SJ area.  I was raised in Saratoga, CA, went to schools in Cupertino and went to  UC Berkeley.  But, what kind of person would I be if I had spent 26 years at Apple?

Apple is a 35 year old company, but the number of data center executives who came from Apple is unknown.  Apple hired one of top data center executives with Olivier Sanche's arrival.  His replacement is not known publicly and is not Kevin Timmons.  Thanks to my blog post on Kevin leaving Microsoft for Apple., there is huge speculation Apple has big data center plans and cloud computing.

But, let me tell you another side of what happens after I posted.  Some of my data center friends cautioned me posting on Kevin leaving Microsoft going to Apple as "your post will make Kevin famous and known in the industry."  True.  But, I'll tell you one thing that happened immediately after the news spread.  Apple PR called Kevin to make sure that he doesn't talk to any media.  Not about Apple,  Not about Microsoft.  Not about anything data center related.  How do I know?  Did I talk to Kevin?  No.  But, this is exactly what happened when I blogged about Olivier Sanche leaving eBay going to Apple.  Olivier and I had no idea the news would be so big, but one of the first calls was from Apple's PR department to figure out who this data center guy was that media guys were calling about.  Apple PR is probably trying to figure out who the hell is this Dave Ohara and his green data center blog, telling the world about the data center executives we hire.

With Apple PR clamping down on data center executives like Kevin Timmons's, high visibility virtually disappears over time as there no other words shared.  With Amazon's Cloud Drive, new media services from Google around the corner, and the media watching for Apple's next step it is quite possible the Apple PR team is clamping down even harder on any data center news being shared.

Which gets back to my title question.

Is working at Apple the end of the career for a data center executive?

Working at Apple was the end of Olivier Sanche's career.

Can Apple's data center solution be put on course with the hiring of one data center executive, Kevin Timmons?

What is not totally clear is whether Apple can operate data centers to compete against Google, Microsoft,  and Amazon.

The media has their opinion.  But, would you run a data center based on what mass media thinks?  Think about that one for a while.

I trust my data center advice from the insiders who run data centers 7x24 365 days a year with decades of experience.

5 points amongst many others to think about if you buy from an ODM server vs. OEM

With Facebook sharing its server design and use of Quanta for its server supply.

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We worked with Alfa Tech, AMD, Delta, Intel,Power-One, Quanta and Synnex to develop of the first generation of technologies.

There are now bunches of IT purchasing departments looking to save money by buying direct and cutting out the middle man.  I’ve been laughing with my friends who have managed outsourced manufacturing projects on how naïve people are to how complex and difficult it is to buy direct from a manufacturer.  I got most of my hardware sourcing experience taking dozens and dozens trips to Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and China while I worked for Apple Computer, managing various peripheral projects for the Macintosh.  There is a huge reason why many companies have dual suppliers to manage price and quality, keeping the supplier constantly competing and knowing they will lose business if they can’t keep up.

To give you an idea of what few will hear about the Quanta Servers going to Facebook, check out this rumor of Quanta getting 20% margin on servers when their typical OEM server margin is 4%.

Order by the Facebook server Quanta: gross margin over 20%

April 18, 2011

Beijing the morning of April 18, according to informed sources, Taiwan’s contract manufacturers Quanta Facebook server to obtain orders, gross profit margin as high as 20% or more.

Reportedly, these servers will start shipping this fall, the order is Quanta gross margin is 5 times the daily orders, up to 20%.

Quanta declined to comment on.

Facebook server orders usually get HP and Dell. The Quanta favor, marking the influence of Taiwan’s contract manufacturers is growing.

At Apple we had teams who knew component cost, quality and performance issues.  They managed Bill of Materials (BOM) had HW engineering, Quality engineering, and purchasing expertise.  This is a big part of Apple’s IP that rarely gets out, and they’ve been working on outsourced manufacturing for decades.  Who would leave Apple’s HW team to go work on Amazon Kindle, HP, Barnes & Noble, etc.   I worked in the Apple purchasing group 25 years ago, and it was a blast in the Mac days.

Even the Wal-mart purchasing staff don’t know how to do things at Apple’s level.  Have you ever seen a retail hit coming with a Wal-mart brand that was designed and developed by Wal-mart? 

Dell has attempted to educate some people with 5 points to consider in when choosing a server vendor.

Whitepaper: 5 points to consider when choosing a Server Vendor for Hyperscale Data Centers

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A whitepaper came out a little while ago from the management consulting firm, PRTM, that gives a perspective on the server industry.  The paper, which Dell was one of the contributors to, specifically focuses on something near and dear to our hearts, hyperscale data centers.

The paper, entitled Hyperscale Data Centers: Value of a Server Brand, talks about what organizations who are looking to build out these ginormous data centers should consider when selecting a system vendor.

But, there will be many who will dismiss this advice coming from a server OEM.

Want to know if I am right?  Watch the Server ODMs profit margins increase as many more people buy direct.

What most people don’t know is the ODMs are very clever in making it appear like they are supplying high quality just as good as the OEMs.  Cut out the middle man drop the price a bit.  But, there are many ways to cut costs which gives the ODM a 20% margin vs. 4% going through HP and Dell.  So, you think you have the game figured out and want a lower price.  And, the ODM looks for more ways to cut costs. 

Can you outsmart a huge team of Chinese engineers and business people with your one, two, maybe three people spec’ing a server?

Do you Trust your server supplier?

We’ve all seen disastrous product recalls on technology products.  Imagine 100s or 1,000s of servers being recalled.

For example, the unsexy capacitor has caused millions of dollars of damage.

Faulty capacitors have been discovered in motherboards as old as Socket 7 and have affected equipment manufactured up to at least 2007. The motherboard companies assembled and sold boards with faulty caps sourced from other manufacturers (see below). Major vendors such as Intel, Dell and HP were affected.^[2] Circa 2005 Dell spent some US $150 million replacing motherboards entirely and another $150 million on the logistics of determining whether a system is in need of replacement. HP reportedly purged its product line in 2004. The motherboards and power supplies in Apple iMac G5s^[3] and some eMacs^[4] were also affected.

Welcome to the world of managing a ODM.  Late night regular phone calls to Asia, last minute war room meetings to address quality or supply issues.  Making the decision after weeks of phone calls, faxe’s, and e-mails, you need to get on a plane to China to resolve the issues.

Oh one other thing, at Apple it was worthwhile to do all this because the volumes were in 100,000s per month.  Only the server OEMs buy in this quantity.  As soon as you drop to 10,000 per month or less, you lose a lot of leverage with the ODM and you don’t have the benefit of large volumes to spread out your support costs.

50 Open Source Machines, imagine Facebook’s Open Compute Project doing the same

TED conference has a presentation by Marcin Jakubowski on Open-sourced blueprints for civilization.  Here is a video of Marcin’s talk.  It is 4:11.

Here are excerpts from the transcript.

We've identified the 50 most important machines that we think it takes for modern life to exist -- things from tractors, bread ovens, circuit makers. Then we set out to create an open source, DIY, do it yourself version that anyone can build and maintain at a fraction of the cost. We call this the Global Village Construction Set.

Here is a radical idea. Can you imagine a data center built like this?

I realized that the truly appropriate, low-cost tools that I needed to start a sustainable farm and settlement just didn't exist yet. I needed tools that were robust, modular, highly efficient and optimized, low-cost, made from local and recycled materials that would last a lifetime, not designed for obsolescence. I found that I would have to build them myself. So I did just that. And I tested them.And I found that industrial productivity can be achieved on a small scale.

Now you wouldn’t build this in the US, but maybe you could take this approach in an emerging market.

Wouldn’t it be cool if Facebook’s Open Compute Project supported the same vision of Marcin?

If this idea is truly sound, then the implications are significant. A greater distribution of the means of production, environmentally sound supply chains,and a newly-relevant DIY maker culture can hope to transcend artificial scarcity. We're exploring the limits of what we all can do to make a better world with open hardware technology.

Thank you.

(Applause)

Is Facebook the Lightning Rod for Environmental Impact of Data Centers?

DataCenterKnowledge posts on Facebook's 100KW Solar array.

Facebook Installs Solar Panels at New Data Center

April 16th, 2011 : Rich Miller

Facebook has built a large solar array next to its new data center in Prineville, Oregon (Photo: Rich Miller, Data Center Knowledge).

Facebook has installed a large array of solar panels at its new data center in Prineville, Oregon, which will supplement the local utility in providing electricity for the 300,000 square foot facility, which was officially opened at a ceremony yesterday.

For more than a year, the environmental group Greenpeace International has been bashing Facebook over its use of electricity generated by “dirty coal” to support its huge new Oregon data center  – a campaign that continued Friday as Facebook opened the new facility.

The photo Rich has of the solar array on a cloudy day reminded me of a post I wrote 2 years ago on who Greenpeace's first data center target would be.

What is the First Greenpeace Data Center Target? Apple? Google? Microsoft?

TUESDAY, JULY 28, 2009 AT 9:20AM

Datacenterknowledge blogs on how quickly Apple is building its $1 billion dollar data center.

APPLE MOVING QUICKLY ON NC PROJECT

July 28th, 2009 : Rich Miller

Apple is known for keeping its new technology secret prior to launch.

And, I closed with the following.

How can Greenpeace, not already have a plan in place to address Apple’s data center for its environmental impact?

Now, you could say Greenpeace why not go after Google or Microsoft?  Greenpeace could, but why haven’t they already.  It is not worth it for media coverage.  Going after Apple would get people’s attention.

If not Apple, who else makes sense to go after if you were Greenpeace?

With Earth Day coming up Facebook is the one company as a target for Greenpeace and the rest of the data center industry is relieved.  Facebook is a convenient target being the only data center operator I know that had an option to source hydro or coal power for its data center and selected coal.

When Greenpeace went after environmental impact of PC products they targeted HP, Dell, and Apple.  Is it time for Apple, Microsoft, and Google to feel the attention of Greenpeace or is Facebook the only high carbon impact data center user out there?

I'll be at Green:NET 2011 later this week and will be in this session.

GREENPEACE INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP – ROOM 2

Dirty Data: How the Cloud is Powered and Why it Matters for the Climate

Greenpeace will release a new analysis that looks at leading IT companies (Facebook, Apple, Google, and more) and asks if IT, as it builds out the cloud, will perpetuate the dirty energy issues of older, entrenched industries or will be the innovative sector that creates a business model that prioritizes a future built on clean, renewable energy?

Speakers:Gary Cook - Senior IT Policy Analyst, Greenpeace International

Background Story on breaking the Kevin Timmons news

2 days ago I started getting e-mail from people asking if I had heard Kevin Timmons was leaving Microsoft.  I would go to Google News and Twitter to see if there was anyone discussing Kevin leaving Microsoft.  24 hours later, after bunches more e-mail and phone conversations I felt the news was pretty much out there, but I was still hesitant to blog about Kevin leaving as it felt just too much like gossip.  Then a good friend and I were chatting and we bounced a bunch of ideas and laughed about the Manchurian Candidate which is used here.

In one of the data center insider conversations a friend jokingly mentioned The Manchurian Candidate where sleeper agents are placed in strategic positions, and later are activated for covert activities.  With so many executives moving from competing companies will there be psychological analysis looking for latent devious action?  Nah. But, it was good for a laugh.  Which by the way is part of chatting about who is moving where.  We eventually start laughing about some move somewhere which could make this appear like gossip.  But, we know the data center executive shortage is real, and where the scarce resources go influences the system.

Then I remembered the e-mail Mike Manos shared on how he recruited Daniel Costello another person who left Microsoft who went to Google.

Mike Manos is proud of his renegade action to recruit Daniel from Intel to Microsoft while he had the job that Kevin Timmons had filled and now departed.

I called him [Daniel Costello] and told him I needed him for my program.  No HR.  No Recruiters.  I wanted the best talent possible and he was it.   I offered him the job on the spot over the phone.   We were building something incredible.

These ideas inspired me to write about the Data Center Shortage of Data Center Executives.

Part of the fun I had writing this post was to give just enough details to make it interesting, and leave plenty of room for other media to tell a different story and do their own research.  Rich Miller at DataCenterKnowledge was  the first to pick up the news and get the Dayne Sampson quote.  And DataCenterDynamics followed referencing Rich, then the news reached the viral stage and was spreading rapidly to other media, bloggers, and Twitter.

Here are the current news coverage.

Yoink! Apple Grabs Microsoft's Data Center Chief

Forbes (blog) - Brian Caulfield - ‎35 minutes ago‎

Apple has hired the man who runs Microsoft's data center services group, data center industry blog Green Data Center blog revealed Wednesday. The news comes as Apple finishes construction of a new 500000 foot data center in Maiden, ...

Apple Steals Microsoft Employee To Run Its Mysterious New Data Center (AAPL, MSFT)

San Francisco Chronicle - ‎6 hours ago‎

Apple is ramping up its data centers, and now it has a new person to help: Kevin Timmons, who has led Microsoft's data center business for the last two years or so. Microsoft confirmed to Data Center Knowledge that he's left the company, ...

Microsoft's datacenter whiz to take “leadership position” at Apple. Is Netflix ...

9 to 5 Mac - ‎4 hours ago‎

MacRumors spotted an interesting report by Data Center Knowledge claiming Kevin Timmons, Microsoft's former high-ranked exec in charge of their worldwide data center operations, is expected to take a “leadership” position. Prior to spending two years ...

Microsoft data center GM leaves, reportedly for Apple

GeekWire - Todd Bishop - ‎4 hours ago‎

The general manager in charge of Microsoft's data center operations, Kevin Timmons, has left the company for a job at Apple, according to reports by Data Center Knowledge and the Green Data Center Blog. Timmons joined Microsoft two years ago from Yahoo ...

Apple (AAPL) Reportedly Snaps Up Microsoft (MSFT) Cloud Creator

StreetInsider.com (subscription) - ‎4 hours ago‎

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has reportedly wooed away the man who helped build Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ: MSFT) data centers that powered its cloud operations. Kevin Timmons, the general manager of datacenter services at Microsoft, has left the company ...

Apple snags Microsoft's data center manager

Macgasm - ‎5 hours ago‎

Apple has hired Kevin Timmons according to sources, but his capacity at Apple is still unknown. Previously Timmons was the general manager of Microsoft's data center group, and he has also previously worked for GeoCities/Yahoo. ...

Apple woos data center guru away from Microsoft for cloud services

Apple Insider - Neil Hughes - ‎7 hours ago‎

The man who helped build data centers for Microsoft's cloud operations is said to have left the Redmond, Wash., software giant to work for Apple. Kevin Timmons, general manager of datacenter services at Microsoft, has left the company to ...

Kevin Timmons leaves Microsoft

DatacenterDynamics - Penny Jones - ‎9 hours ago‎

Microsoft's general manager for data center operations Kevin Timmons has left, and according to media reports, is headed to Apple. Microsoft CVP of Global Foundation Services Dayne Samson, in a statement issued today, said: “Kevin Timmons, ...

Microsoft Data Center GM Timmons Heads to Apple

Data Center Knowledge - Rich Miller - ‎12 hours ago‎

Kevin Timmons, who helped build the data centers that power Microsoft's global cloud computing operation, has left the company and is expected to take a leadership position at Apple. The move strongly hints that Apple is stepping up its plans for an ...

All 10 related articles »

Blogs

Apple Poaches Microsoft's Datacenter GM

All Things Digital (blog) - John Paczkowski - ‎6 hours ago‎

Timmons left Microsoft this week and the company has confirmed his departure, though it declined to say why he left or where he was headed. But sources in position to know confirm he's hired on with Apple. ...

Now when you run Twitter search for Kevin Timmons you can see the news http://twitter.com/#!/search/kevin%20timmons.  2 days when I searched there was only 3 entries.

I asked for feedback on my blog post from 4 data center friends before publishing, and the comments were.

Cool stuff!

Wow...one of your best ever in my opinion.

Nice! I love it! :)

I like it a lot. It is a VERY real issue facing our industry if you think about it. I know the names of just about every exec at this level and is a surprise when you hear some new name.
I wonder how long it will take for supply of quality DC exec talent will meet/exceed the pace of need. If ever?

This is what gave me the confidence to hit Publish yesterday as there was more of a story to tell than Kevin moving from Microsoft to Apple.

It would have been interesting to see how the news would have spread, but it’s kind of fun being the one who pushes the first domino and watch the rest fall.