Scott McNealy

Scott McNealy, chairman and CEO of Sun Microsystems, cofounded the company in 1982, not long after the introduction of the IBM PC. Over the last 19 years, McNealy has been on a mission to prove his company's slogan: "The network is the computer." According to McNealy, the full value of the computer can be realized only by linking PCs, workstations, servers, and every other form of hardware.

Not surprisingly, Sun's mission has put it on a collision course with Microsoft, a company that views the PC as the heart of the computing paradigm. This has also led McNealy to champion consumer choice, technology competition, and the open-source movement. "Through the community process," says McNealy, "technology matures faster than it would otherwise. But the real story is that the PC is no longer the center of the computing universe."

Michael J. Miller: In retrospect, what significant changes resulted from the advent of the PC?

Scott McNealy: The PC represents the beginning of popular distributed computing. At first, most people viewed PCs as standalone, personal productivity machines. It was our good fortune to recognize right from the start how much more could be accomplished by linking desktops together. That's the great significance of TCP/IP and other open standards. In fact, the standardization of interfaces led to the commodization of parts, which dramatically lowered system costs. Standards such as TCP/IP, NFS, and HTML have all proven successful for the same reason.

Michael: In the face of the PC, how was Sun able to carve out such a unique and strong position?

Scott: We brought a novel approach to the design and functionality of the workstation. As its power and breadth grew, we were able to apply our unique architectural approach to servers, which in many ways "commoditized" server systems.

Also by combining the hardware and software into a cohesive unit, we're able to produce tightly integrated and highly optimized systems. And it's critical to own all of our key intellectual property. Without that, we would be at the mercy of someone else for the future innovation of our key components.

Michael: Yet in Sun's approach to software, it blurs the line be-tween traditional open-source and proprietary technology. How does this work in your favor? How do you strike the right balance?

Scott: Sun is the most open technology company I can think of. We've always published our programming interfaces so that anyone can make a compatible product. We've also taken that openness a step farther in recent years by making the source code for Solaris and our other software freely available. That way, developers know there are no hidden "gotchas," and customers know there are no proprietary lock-ins.

We are a big supporter and a big contributor to the opensource movement, especially with products like StarOffice productivity suite, JXTA P2P protocols, and so on. The reason we've maintained a stewardship role with Java is to preserve its cross-platform compatibility.

Michael: What about going forward?

Scott: We plan to use that innovative approach to attack other opportunities, such as storage and peer-to-peer computing. We have an open-source, peer-to-peer effort called JXTA, which is being spearheaded by Bill Joy. Imagine turning network congestion into a good thing! That's what this does. eMikolo Networks demonstrated one of the first JXTA applications at this year's JavaOne conference. You saw it; performance increased as more peers linked to a video on the Net. That's pretty cool.

Michael: You've said, "The PC is dead." With so many people still using PCs, and so many who still don't have them, why do you think this is true?

Scott: Clearly, people aren't about to throw their PCs out the window, though I'm sure they often feel like it. On the other hand, a lot of people and organizations are starting to realize that maybe they don't need that kind of technological hairball on their desks; there are much simpler information appliances available for the home, the office, and the classroom. Plus, people will increasingly access Web services through mobile devices—wireless phones, pagers, and PDAs—more than they will through PCs.

Michael: Where, then, do you see the most important innova- tions occurring?

Scott: They will probably evolve around open standards, where network effects come into play. Just as you could say TCP/IP (the Internet protocol stack) was the most significant computing innovation in the past 20 years, new standards like XML will likely have far-reaching effects over the next 20.

I'd also keep an eye on what's happening in the peer-to-peer or distributed computing space. Think of it as a Napster for more than music.

Michael: What factors will fuel these future innovations?

Scott: Bandwidth. Since 1975, people have been amazed at the increases in microprocessor speed. In that same time frame, bandwidth doubled every 16 months—and even much faster than that in the past few years. Greater bandwidth is going to open up all kinds of new possibilities. Everything is going digital—music, movies, TV, photography—and it's going to converge on a single digital network: the Internet. It will transform broadcasting into unicasting. You'll have one channel to watch—the one you program yourself. You'll watch what you want, when you want, and you'll have the bandwidth to access it.