National Grid Seminar Series

Future of Grid Computing - In the Clouds

Dr. Martin Antony Walker
DIC, PhD, Hewlett-Packard (Europe, Middle East & Africa)

20 May 2008 (Tuesday)
1600 hours @ NLB Building, 100 Victoria Street
Possibility Room, Level 05

Abstract

Cloud computing is new, very dynamic, and attracting a lot of attention from large numbers of people. Some serious observers think it is a truly disruptive technology. Yet the basic underlying vision is essentially the same as we had for grid computing ten years ago: computing, storage, and data processing available over a network as a utility. This talk will explore grid and cloud computing from several perspectives to try to arrive at a balanced picture of a rapidly evolving field.

Biodata

Martin Antony Walker is responsible for business in the scientific research segment of the high-performance computing market for Hewlett Packard in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). He leads HP’s engagement in petascale computing in Europe. Martin serves on the program committee for the HP Tech Con 2008 conference. He was Secretary of the Board of Directors of the Open Grid Forum until August 2007. Dr. Walker serves on the External Advisory Committee of the Baltic Grid Project and on the Technical Advisory Board of the South Eastern Europe Research and Education Network. He advises the HP-UNESCO anti brain-drain projects in South East Europe and Africa, and is a reviewer for the HP Philanthropy Technology for Teaching program. Starting in 1996, Dr. Walker co-led the successful entry of Digital Equipment, then Compaq Computer, into the scientific and technical computing market in Europe, and has helped set strategic marketing and product development directions in high-performance computing for Digital, Compaq, and HP. From 1991 to 1996, Dr. Walker was Director, Parallel Applications, for parallel processor product development, and founding director of the Parallel Applications Technology Program at Cray Research, Inc. He played several key roles in the development and sales of large-scale parallel computer systems at Myrias Research Corporation from 1984 to 1991. Dr. Walker received a DIC and PhD in mathematics and physics from the University of London in 1970, and has lectured and published widely in the scientific literature on relativistic gravitational collapse, black holes, gravitational radiation, and related topics. He was a member of scientific staff at the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics, Munich, Germany, from 1971 to 1984. During his research career, Dr. Walker held visiting positions at leading universities and research institutions around the world.

Admission is Free. All are Welcome.