P.K. Agarwal recently accomplished his 25 year milestone in public service with the State of California. Now, as the the Chief Technology Officer for the State, P.K. continues to drive and shape IT operations and services in state government. He is noted for saving millions of dollars through the consolidation of California’s data centers. While striving to keep pace with the future, P.K. is focused on building the state’s technology infrastructure for the 21st century. Working smarter and greener is always on his agenda.

P. K. is a national speaker on IT issues spreading the message of innovation while showcasing his wit and charm. As director of a California state department and 2008 President of the National Electronic Commerce Coordinating Council (eC3), P.K. is often invited to speak to both public and private audiences. At these speaking engagements, he combines his knowledge of public policy, global economy, and IT to provide thought provoking insights into the future of technology and the shape of things to come. P.K. has also served as President of the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO), and has considerable private sector experience at EDS Corporation, NIC, Inc., and ACS, Inc.

Mystified with nanotechnology, an avid tennis player and father of three, he has a wealth of knowledge to share.

Ric Telford's professional business career highlights 25 years of product development experience and is noted for bringing innovative approaches to the design and development of key technologies. During his tenure at IBM, Telford has played a number of key roles in various software initiatives for IBM, including email products, imaging products unit, networking and security software, and software mobility products.

Ric tends to be at the forefront of emerging technologies at IBM.  He served as Director of Technology for the IBM CIO, responsible for the development, implementation and adoption of technologies that hastened   the transformation of IBM into an e-business.  Ric was the Director of Technology for Intelligent Infrastructure, the precursor in IBM to “e-business on demand.  Ric went on to become VP of Autonomic Computing, where he was responsible for defining and driving the Autonomic Computing initiative for IBM.  Autonomic Computing is the set of capabilities required to make a computing system more self-managing, much like the human autonomic system.  Ric worked across IBM, as well as the industry and academia, to promote the adoption of open-standards based self-managing technologies.  In his prior role as CTO, Infrastructure Management Services, Ric was responsible for the technical strategy and plans for a number of Service Product Lines in Global Technology Services, including Server Services, Storage Services and Security Services.

In his current assignment as VP of  Integration and Development, IT Optimization, Ric is responsible for defining complete IBM solutions for customers looking to transform their IT infrastructure.  Leveraging IBM’s vast software, hardware and services assets, the IT Optimization business unit provides offerings focused on such transformation topics such as Consolidation/Virtualization, Energy Efficient Data Center and Service Level Attainment.

Ric holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, graduating magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. Ric resides in Morrisville, NC and has two sons.   Ric enjoys mountain biking, swimming and golf. 
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Over 25 years in the HVACR industry, the last 17 years in designing and engineering automation controls for high tech companies, commercial and REIT.  Data Center design, implementation and monitoring of EEM projects and has completed several EEM and ADR projects that have reduced over 10 Million kW‐H’s and provided to Customers over $3.5 M in direct incentives from the IOU’s( PG&E, SCE and SDG&E). 

Recent involvement with the Green Grid, EPA legislation for Data Center Energy Efficiencies law (HR6), Energy Efficiency Measures (EEM), AutoDR, SVLG-Energy Watch Partnership Programs and Energy Management Programs.

Memberships include AFE, ISA, USGBC

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A recognized leader in the industry, Christian Belady is Microsoft's Principal Power and Cooling Architect for Global Foundation Services where his role is to improve both efficiency and cost in their online services infrastructure.  In addition, his responsibilities included driving initiatives for sustainability in the data center and infrastructure space. 

Prior to joining Microsoft, Christian was a Distinguished Technologist for HP where his responsibilities included driving the technology direction in HP's server products and their environments as well as driving industry data center initiatives. In addition, his earlier employers include; Convex Computers (acquired by HP), TI and IBM.

With over 68 US patents, Christian is an ASME Fellow, an IMAPS Fellow and a founding member of ASHRAE's TC9.9, which is responsible for developing data center guidelines.  He was one of the early architects of the Green Grid, and continues to participate actively with the group.   He also works closely with government agencies globally to define efficiency metrics for data centers and servers. 

Christian has published several dozen papers and has a featured speaker on power and cooling trends at events across the industry.  Since the late 90s, the focus of his publications has been on data centers and the industry's need for engineering efficient computing environments.  Christian has engineering degrees from Cornell University (BS) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (MS) and a business degree from the University of Texas at Dallas (MA).
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Calvin Nicholson BSEE 1988, MBA 1996, University of Nevada, Reno; Currently the Director of Product Marketing for Server Technology Inc., Server Technology designs and manufacturer’s intelligent power distribution products for enterprise data centers.  Previously the Director of Product Marketing, with GameTech International creating strategies and specifications for new product development of Class II Gaming Management systems, games and portable bingo card minding devices for 5 years. Calvin also held various positions in the Process Control Instrumentation field for over 10 years, including Sales Engineer, Product Manager, Account Manager and Marketing Manager for ABB with both domestic and international responsibility.
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Chris Verges is a technical sales engineer and project manager at Cyber Switching, Inc. based in San Jose, CA.  In his current role, Chris assists with pre- and post-sales support, tracks status of development projects, and aids customers in designing power distribution grids.  These duties combine with his passion for technology and his background in IT & facilities support.  Chris graduated in 2004 from the Georgia Institute of Technology and currently attends San Jose State University part-time where he is obtaining an MBA/MSE dual degree.  Chris lives in San Carlos, CA with his wife Katherine.  When not working, Chris likes to hike trails around the Bay Area and explore the art of photography.  Chris can be reached at chrisv@cyberswitching.com.
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President and Chief Energy Officer of MegaWatt Consulting, Inc.
KC Mares is currently spearheading data center energy efficiency programs for Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and an IT industry energy efficiency roadmap the Department of Energy. He is also working with various companies to develop highly efficient computer data centers along with creating new business development and products in the data center space.

Recently, Mr. Mares was responsible for overseeing the negotiations, strategy, development, and construction of Yahoo!’s data centers and renewable energy projects worldwide. He led creative new ways to reduce energy consumption across the data centers as part of the company’s overall carbon neutral and energy efficiency efforts. Mr. Mares also created innovative data center solutions for Google, BEA Systems, Equinix, DuPont Fabros and others. He has led energy initiatives, projects and key customer efforts at Exodus Communications and for Cable & Wireless and he has developed about $10 billion of data centers in over a dozen countries. He has managed performance-based energy contracts for Johnson Controls and Honeywell and has negotiated over $150 million worth of electricity and natural gas contracts, and developed co-generation and renewable energy projects.

Mr. Mares has co-chaired the Silicon Valley Leadership Group's Energy Committee and served as the director of energy for Sun Microsystems, Mervyn’s, and Target stores. His work has earned numerous awards, including EnergyStar Partner of the Year twice. He has crafted new legislation of energy solutions and is a great zealot and pundit of long-term solutions that improve company earnings and the quality of life, environment and provide sustained economic vitality.
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Dean is the senior director of Global Lab & Datacenter Design Services (GDS) in the Workplace Resources business unit of Sun Microsystems. GDS bridges the gap between Facilities and IT/Engineering and is currently managing more than $250 million in datacenter design and construction activity. Dean has been at Sun for 16 years, working in manufacturing, engineering and workplace resources. His responsibilities have also included helping the drive to achieve ISO 9002 certification; leading systems and network administration support for some of Sun's largest and most complex R&D lab environments; and creating the strategy to standardize Sun's multi-billion dollar technical infrastructure portfolio.

Dean is on the technical advisory board for Mission Critical Magazine, Vice President of AFCOM Northern California Chapter, author of the Sun Blueprint, "Energy Efficient Datacenters: The Role of Modularity in Datacenter Design" and was featured in Contrarian Minds, a focus on the engineers, scientists and dreamers of Sun Microsystems.

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Herb Villa is the Field Technical Manager (Datacomm Group) with Rittal Corporation of Springfield, OH.  With a background in mechanical engineering, Herb brings almost 20 years of experience in the IT market, having been involved in all aspects of system design, installation and support as well as seeing it from three unique vantage points – manufacturer, integrator, supplier.

With Rittal for over 12 years, Herb brings this experience to the design and implementation of data center facilities.  He has provided training to end users, installation contractors and design consultants, in conferences, the classroom and on site.  Herb has brought this knowledge to many different clients in financial services, Fortune 500 companies, manufacturing organizations, education and government agencies.  Rittal Corporation is a full service enclosure manufacturer with production facilities in Springfield, OH and as a unit of the Loh Group of Companies is part of the world’s largest manufacturer of standard, modular and custom enclosure solutions.
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Mr. Anderson is the IDC Architects Director of Mission Critical Facilities. He has 28 years of experience in the management and design of advanced technology, industrial and power facilities. Projects that he has been involved with include data centers, microelectronics facilities, telecommunications, utility substation design, and electrical power generating facilities. Mr. Anderson holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering, and a M.S. in Electrical Engineering, Computer Integrated Manufacturing.   He is a Professional Electrical Engineer in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington; and he is a Professional Control Systems Engineer in Oregon.
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Mr. Seger is the principal mechanical engineer for IDC Architects (IDCA) Critical Environment group, and heads up the firm’s critical environment mechanical engineering design staff.  He has 25 years of experience in a variety of projects for industries specializing in critical environments for manufacturing and data processing.  He has overseen data center facility designs in the U.S. and internationally, including those that utilize air-side economizers, water-side economizers, and those that operate in excess of 500 watts per square foot. Mr. Seger participated in a panel discussion on data center energy efficiency at the Data Centers Europe 2007 in London, England and has recently co-authored, with Andy Solberg, an article on the benefits of using computational fluid dynamics for evaluation of the impact of the outside environment on the design of data center facility. Mr. Seger holds a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Oregon State University and is a registered professional engineer in the State of Oregon.
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Mark Thiele is Director of Business Operations for R&D at VMware. As Director of Business Operations R&D Mark’s responsibilities include Data Center planning, logistics, M&A, and supply chain.

Previous to VMware Mark held various IT leadership roles including most recently as Director of Global Infrastructure for Brocade, in San Jose. He represented Brocade to Green Grid and the Silicon Valley Leadership Group DC Efficiency Project. At Gilead Mark built IT infrastructure that supported company growth from $225 million to $2.03 billion over a 4 year period. AT HP Mark held various IT Infrastructure leadership roles, including Web development, Data Centers, & Client Support.
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Mr. Phelps brings over twenty-five years of marketing and technology experience in storage and IT to his role as Product Line Marketing Manager for AdaptivCool, Degree Controls’ data center division.  In this role, Wally is responsible for product marketing and management, business development and product/market strategies.  Mr. Phelps has authored numerous White Papers on data center cooling and efficiency and has written articles for publications such as Equipment Protection and Mission Critical.  He has also been quoted extensively on data center trends in numerous industry publications including InformationWeek, Processor, The Data Center Journal, SearchDataCenter.com and Wall Street & Technology.  Mr Phelps is also active in his local AFCOM chapter and has presented at AFCOM’s Data Center World Prior to joining AdaptivCool, Mr. Phelps held senior management positions in IT and storage at Digital Equipment, Nashua, Panasonic and Quantum.
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Dan Wilson, President of Wilson International Networking, is a senior quality and information technology management professional. Dan holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering and has worked as an IT manager for several Fortune 500 companies. Dan has worked in the data center management, quality assurance, quality control, conformance assurance, project management, and asset management fields since 1977. Dan has benefitted by a broad view of quality, systems and environmental management in manufacturing and computer industries. Since 1996 Dan has been involved with quality and data center management systems for OSRAM Sylvania, the leading lighting manufacturer in North America. And since 2003 Dan has been responsible for OSRAM Sylvania enterprise production, enterprise disaster recovery and development/QA data centers. Dan has initiated and implemented environmental and energy projects to generate significant ongoing cost savings in data center operations. By working with the architects for technologies such as networks, data security, servers, data bases, enterprise applications (SAP, Manugistics, PeopleSoft. Etc) and business units for sales, manufacturing, distribution, supply management and customer service, as well as OSRAM worldwide operations in Europe and Asia, Dan has developed a comprehensive computer operations overview of the company.  In 2008 Dan decided to make his expertise available to organizations outside of OSRAM Sylvania as an independent consultant and has made contacts with many former colleagues to develop a network of professionals to provide excellence in computing operations.
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Ray Glynn is Vice President Sales The Americas for Trapeze Networks. Glynn has had a memorable career in technology sales, including telecommunications, voicemail, call center and networking senior sales management positions with companies such as ComPath, Octel, EchoPass, Polycom and Radvision. He has been VP Sales for Trapeze for 18 months.
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Mansour Karam leads Business Development for Arista Networks. Prior to Arista, Mansour was Principal Application Architect at Routescience, acquired by Avaya in 2005. Mansour holds multiple patents, and was awarded a top-10 papers award at Infocom 2000. Mansour holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.
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Kevin Garrison is currently the regional vice president for Akorri where is responsible for direct and channel sales management. He has over 23 years in the business working at major manufacturers (EMC, Cisco, Network Appliance, and Data General) and startups (Akorri, ONStor and SANlight). His responsibilities have ranged from direct sales and sales management to channel sales and channel sales management. Prior to joining Akorri, Garrison served as Director, Western US Channel Sales for Network Appliance where he was Responsible for managing all aspects of Network Appliance's channel sales activities in the Western US representing more than $200M in annual revenue contribution and more than 50% year over year growth. Kevin is a frequent speaker in the industry and recently spoke at the Vmware "Managing Virtual Data Centers," executive luncheon.
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