PROCESSORS

By Steve Fisher, Editor In Chief -- On Monday of this week Cray, Inc. named a new President & CEO and announced a Cray SV-1 contract with an anonymous government agency. In addition to these significant developments, after the markets closed last night they announced the new SX-6 series of supercomputers (separate SX-6 interview coming soon). To learn more about this busy week in the life of Cray, Supercomputing Online interviewed Chairman Jim Rottsolk, and new President and CEO Michael Haydock. Supercomputing: What prompted the move of bringing on a new President/CEO? ROTTSOLK: Cray Inc. is entering the next stage of our evolution. We have been in heavy R&D mode since April 2000, when Tera Computer Company and the former Cray Research unit of SGI began operating together as Cray Inc. We have several new product lines due out later this year and in 2002, and we plan to sharply increase our activities and expand our market presence with these products. We will need the combined experience and "bandwidth" of both Mike and me to make the most of our opportunities. Supercomputing: Mr. Haydock, congratulations on the new position. From looking at your background you are obviously very qualified for this position. What do you feel is the greatest asset you bring to Cray? HAYDOCK: I have a passion for supercomputing that dates back to the early 1980's and am a former user of Cray supercomputers. I spent the early part of my career with Control Data, ending up in the supercomputer area of the firm. I went to IBM originally to build a consulting practice focused on high performance computing. Over time, this became a large unit of IBM Global Services. The Cray opportunity gives me the chance to refocus my interests on supercomputing. I want to see Cray return to the dominant position in the supercomputing space. IBM is a great company and I have learned a lot. This move isn't so much about leaving IBM as it is about wanting to be a part of the journey with Cray. Supercomputing: Please tell our readers a bit about Cray's corporate roadmap. Where do you see the company, and its stock price, in say...one year? ROTTSOLK: Cray Inc. designs high-bandwidth, high-efficiency supercomputers for the most-demanding technical customers and users. Our role is to be the primary incubator for supercomputer architectural innovation. That's important, because the clusters and clustered SMP systems that represent the bulk of today's HPC market are not true supercomputers. They are collections of servers or PCs, designed for lower-pricepoint markets, that are opportunistically scaled up for the supercomputer market. That's fine for everyone except those who really need supercomputer power. We offer a range of products, because 'one size' doesn't fit every application and workload. Our current products are the Cray SV1 and Cray T3E. We've almost completed development of the Cray SV1ex with enhanced memory; the revolutionary Cray MTA-2 is scheduled for first customer shipment later this year; and the Cray SV2 is due out in the latter part of 2002. A year from now, I see Cray Inc. strongly positioned for growth. We don't predict stock prices. HAYDOCK: I believe Cray has a major opportunity to stand out in what appears to be a fairly 'vanilla' group of look-alike competitive offerings. Market dynamics are cyclical, and it's hard to believe that theoretical peak performance will remain an acceptable criterion very much longer. People need sustained performance to get work done and advance the science and engineering. Supercomputing: Product-wise, which Cray system do you feel holds the most promise in terms of growth... in terms of sales. ROTTSOLK: Our largest development program, with partial funding support from the U.S. Government, is the Cray SV2, which promises to be the world's most powerful supercomputer product. Although the SV2 isn't due out until the second half of 2002, we are already seeing strong advance demand for this system and are confident the first full year of production will quickly be "spoken for" by government, industrial and academic customers. So, the SV2 is a strong bet to bring in healthy revenue. On the other hand, we have a lot of excitement about the MTA-2. It features a truly revolutionary, multithreaded architecture that could enable a quantum leap forward for some important problems and workloads. In the near term, we expect healthy revenue from the Cray SV1ex system and are also excited about the potential for the Cray SX-6 supercomputer, which is an NEC high-end system we are distributing exclusively in North America and non-exclusively in most other parts of the world. Supercomputing: Would either of you gentlemen care to comment on Monday’s SV-1/anonymous government agency press release? ROTTSOLK: We can't name the customer, of course, but Cray is a leader in sales of mission-critical supercomputer systems for defense-related purposes. We're pleased when customers are satisfied enough to upgrade their Cray systems. Supercomputing: Is there anything else you'd like to add? HAYDOCK: Just a thank you for this opportunity. Supercomputing: The pleasure is all mine gentlemen. I thank you both for your time. ---------- Supercomputing wishes to thank both Jim Rottsolk and Michael Haydock for granting this interview. ----------