Archive for the ‘Lightfleet’ Category

Data-intensive, high-throughput, and transaction-intensive applications all require fast, seamless flow of multiple data streams. These kinds of applications have been hampered by data congestion created in standard interconnects or switches that cannot switch fast enough.

So Lightfleet eliminated the switch.

With its Direct Broadcast Optical Interconnect (DBOI), Lightfleet is at the forefront of the next breakthrough in multiprocessor computing: speeding data flow by using light to connect processors. The DBOI interconnect is the first to use broadcast light to create a true non-blocking architecture.

Now, multiple processors connected to a DBOI interconnect can broadcast data to all of the others, and data arrives at each processor at the same time, at the same high speed, with the same low latency. No more delays. No more congestion.

As a result, computing with the DBOI interconnect gives you All-to-All™ connectivity that lets you shave milliseconds from transactions, get better answers faster, rapidly respond to changing conditions, and slice through peaks in the daily ebb and flow of data.

Dennis F. Hightower, a member of the Lightfleet Board of Directors from 2004 to 2007, rejoined the Board in April, 2008. Mr. Hightower is a retired business executive who has had distinguished careers in both the private and public sectors, including more than 30 years of experience in global marketing, strategic planning, operations and international general management.Most recently, Mr. Hightower was chief executive officer of Europe Online Networks S.A., a privately held broadband interactive entertainment company based in Luxembourg. Prior to joining Europe Online in 2000, Mr. Hightower was, from 1996 to 2000, a professor of Management and a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School.From 1987 to 1996, Mr. Hightower was a senior executive of The Walt Disney Company, where he served as president of Walt Disney Television & Communications (1995-1996); president of Consumer Products, Europe/Middle East and Africa (1992-1995); executive vice president of Consumer Products, Europe/Middle East (1990-1992); senior vice president of Consumer Products, Europe (1989-1990); and vice president of Consumer Products, Europe (1987-1989).

Earlier in his career, Mr. Hightower was managing director and Los Angeles office manager with Russell Reynolds Associates, Inc.; vice president of corporate planning and a corporate officer of Mattel, Inc.; vice president and general manager with General Electric Co. in Mexico; senior associate and engagement manager at McKinsey & Co., Inc; and a manager at Xerox Corporation.

Prior to entering the private sector, Mr. Hightower served in the U.S. Army for eight years, where he rose to the rank of major and was awarded decorations for meritorious achievement and valor. Mr. Hightower holds an M.B.A. degree from Harvard Business School and a B.S. degree from Howard University. He received the Alumni Achievement Award in Business from Howard University in 1986, the Alumni Achievement Award from Harvard Business School in 1992, and the U.S. Department of Commerce Pioneer Award in 1996. In addition to serving on Lightfleet’s board of directors, Mr. Hightower is also a member of the board of Accenture, Domino’s Inc., and a member of the board of trustees of Casey Family Programs.

Greetings from Jay Brandon,

This is my first blog at Lightfleet and I hope you’ll enjoy getting a brief update on some of the recent happenings here.

The big news this week is the return of Dennis Hightower to the Lightfleet board of directors. Dennis brings a wealth of experience and was the former president of Walt Disney Television & Telecommunications and a Harvard business school professor. Dennis is very impressed with the major product progress Lightfleet has made since he last visited us in January of 2006.

A local paper recently published an interesting story on using light to boost computing speed. In the article, a researcher at IBM was quoted as saying “Photons can move data tens or hundreds of times faster than electrons on copper wires” and a senior vice president at Intel said “Copper, our traditional interconnect technology, is running out of speed.” I’m excited to be at Lightfleet as we are blazing the trail into this exciting new area of optical high performance.

That’s all from me. Until next time,
Jay

Lightfleet was founded in 2003 by a team of individuals seeking to deliver simplified solutions in the increasingly complex world of computing. Drawing from diverse backgrounds in optics, signal processing, neural computing, massively parallel processing, and semiconductor design, Lightfleet is uniquely positioned to design faster, cooler, and more compact platforms than have previously existed to date.

By leveraging the properties of light, Lightfleet brings enhanced value to our customers and partners in the form of efficient, flexible, and affordable systems to meet a range of compute needs including transaction processing, data mining, visualization, simulation, and high-throughput, large-scale application processing.

Lightfleet headquarters are located in Camas, Washington. For more information please contact us.

Management Team • Board of Directors
Technologists • Science and Technology Advisory Board

By Steve Alten

I just read about a 75-year-old woman in Karlstad, Sweden who had a 40-gigabit per second Internet connection installed in her house. Karlstad Stadsnät in conjunction with Cisco installed the prototype to show the potential of fiber optics in residential usage. 40 Gb/s is enough to download an entire DVD in 2 seconds or to access 1,500 high definition HDTV channels simultaneously.

So how did such blazing performance affect Sigbritt Löthberg’s life? Did she become the multimedia envy of the block? I’m afraid that would be a big “no”. She primarily used the excessive heat generated by the networking equipment to dry her laundry. She’s looking forward to a planned 100 Gb/s upgrade that is being planned so she can dry her neighbor’s laundry too.

It’s easy to overlook the excess heat generated by networking switches, even if it’s based on fiber optics instead of copper. A data center can be designed to handle the load, but Sigbritt’s experience is a humorous reminder of how wasteful of energy network switches can be.

Systems based on Lightfleet DBOI technology use much less energy than conventional switches. If your primary goal is to dry your clothes, by all means, stick with the status quo!

Click to read the FAQ’s. (more…)

By Steve Alten

Early in 2007, a group of Lightfleet marketing people were discussing the imminent public launch of Lightfleet’s simultaneous, all-to-all, continuous, broadcast optical interconnect invention. Several of us who can’t solve 2^nd order differential equations in our heads anymore, couldn’t help but comment that simultaneous, all-to-all, continuous, broadcast optical interconnect didn’t exactly roll off the tongue. Even the most dedicated evangelist would soon start taking liberties and shorten it ad-hoc. We needed a cool name to call our technology.

A thousand words aren’t always better than a picture

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By Steve Alten

I’m fortunate to live in the Pacific Northwest, where the electricity rates are among the lowest in the nation. My family never turns off our six home computers. We have computers for every family member’s desk, one in the kitchen and we have three PC media centers hooked up to big screen TVs. We have grown so attached of our beloved PCs and Macs that we really wouldn’t choose to ever live without them. However, when I got my electricity bill this month, I couldn’t help but reminisce that it was higher than the monthly payment for the very first new car I bought! I can ask the family to turn lights off when they’re not using them, or to stop using the oven and eat out more, but I can’t really expect them to cut back on the deep love affair with their computer. Corporate and institutional users aren’t very different from my family.

I was the only one who truly liked my first car

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Our preference at Lightfleet Corporation is to recruit candidates directly. We do occasionally partner with a limited number of preferred agencies when we identify a need for third party staffing support. We do not accept unsolicited agency resumes. We will pay a fee only if the candidate is presented after there is a signed recruiting agreement in place between Lightfleet Corporation and the agency and only if we have explicitly engaged the agency to submit resumes for a specific current opening.

We do not pay fees for unsolicited candidates submitted to Lightfleet Corporation or any Lightfleet Corporation employee by email, fax, phone, mail, verbal referral or any other means. In the case of candidates submitted to Lightfleet Corporation without a signed agreement in place or without being solicited to work on a specific open requisition, Lightfleet Corporation explicitly reserves the right to pursue and hire those unsolicited candidates without any financial obligation to the recruiter or agency.

No employee of Lightfleet Corporation has any authority to modify the terms of this notice, or waive the requirement that a written engagement be in place prior to submitting resumes.

Like most companies, Lightfleet is seeking customers for our direct broadcast optical interconnect-DBOI -the technology that computers will use to communicate for the next 10 years.

Since I am in marketing, I did some business research to determine our optimum customer profile. As it turns out, I can reliably predict whether you are a good prospective customer if you will simply answer 15 questions.

Customer Suitability Questionnaire

Lightfleet seeks customers. Please fill out the following Customer Suitability Questionnaire.

1. Did you buy the first IBM-compatible Personal Computer in your county?
2. Have you ever over-clocked a CPU?
3. Do you have a TUX tattoo?
4. Do you already own three tech related items on display in the Museum of Modern Art AND on display in http://www.computerhistory.org?
5. Do you own a Mac, an iPod, an iPhone AND an iTouch?
6. Did you ever operate a Tandy Xenix?
7. Machine language conversant?
8. Think that “Strong AI” are fighting words?
9. Overthrown an empire?
10. Trusted your gut?
11. Played UO, EQ, SWG, WoW? Rank/Class/A/S/L?
12. Kirk or Picard?
13. Go to http://nerdtests.com and report your score here with hyperlinks.
14. Browncoat Y/N?
15. Special bonus credit: Do you have a need to parallel process megatons of data faster than the competition in a very small transportable form factor?

You can send your responses to me: mbliss (at) lightfleet.com.