Bob Howarth, Nobel prize Penzias:"IP will not solve everything. Need ATM ".
Q: What will the network of the future look like?
ÿÿÿ A: There will be copper and there will be fiber......
ÿÿÿ radio....... satellite,....... a variety of protocols...............
ÿÿÿ .......No one size fits all........There will be a lot of complexity,ÿ
.ÿÿÿ ................ But Internet Protocol [the software lingua
ÿÿÿ franca of the Net] isn't going to solve every problem. Not all of this
ÿÿÿ stuff is going to be handled by a single goddamn Internet Protocol
ÿÿÿ network.
Q: Who said it would be?
ÿÿÿ A: Well, John Chambers [CEO of Cisco Systems (CSCO)] says the
ÿÿÿ telephone is a dinosaur. He's a great man, but his mentality is that
ÿÿÿ you should get rid of your phone and use your computer instead.
ÿÿÿ Give me a break.ÿ
TA
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ÿÿ
quantumbridge.com
Business Week Online
ÿÿÿ November 22, 1999 Issue
ÿÿÿ No, Virginia, the Net Is Not Going to Make
ÿÿÿ Everything Simpleÿ
ÿÿÿ Arno Penzias sees a multiplicity of e-devices in which 'no one
ÿÿÿ size fits all'
ÿÿ After 36 years at Bell Laboratories, including three years as director
ÿÿÿ of the legendary research center, Nobel laureate Arno A. Penzias has
ÿÿÿ retired in California. There, he serves as an adviser and investor with
ÿÿÿ blue-blood venture capitalist firm New Enterprise Associates,
ÿÿÿ offering his insights into telecommunications and other technologies.
ÿÿÿ Dressed in a red sweatsuit in his San Francisco home, Penzias
ÿÿÿ shared some of those insights with BUSINESS WEEK's Andy
ÿÿÿ Reinhardt, while cargo ships plied the bay outside his picture
ÿÿÿ windows.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: Why did you leave Bell Labs?
ÿÿÿ A: I had changed everybody's job except mine. So I decided to
ÿÿÿ change, and right at that point, I began to see all these little
ÿÿÿ companies doing interesting things out here. The work we did at Bell
ÿÿÿ Labs had set the stage for all this wonderful stuff. So I came out
ÿÿÿ here, initially with Lucent (LU), and started working with small
ÿÿÿ companies. Now I'm on my own and working with New Enterprise
ÿÿÿ Associates.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: What's your vision of how the communications system is
ÿÿÿ being transformed today?
ÿÿ A: There is going to be intelligence everywhere in the network, but
ÿÿÿ there will be considerably more control at the edge than there is now.
ÿÿÿ Q: What is the difference between intelligence and control?
ÿÿÿ A: Intelligence is what allows a function to be carried out. Control is
ÿÿÿ where the choice is made to use the function. There are big religious
ÿÿÿ arguments about this. But the trend is undeniable. It's like the
ÿÿÿ Internet--where users have control--compared to the old phone
ÿÿÿ system, which was completely centralized. This is a growing theme
ÿÿÿ throughout our whole society, and not just in the communications
ÿÿÿ sector.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: Tell me more about decentralization.
ÿÿÿ A: Back in the industrial age, the image of progress was Pittsburgh,
ÿÿÿ with its huge stone chimneys belching smoke. Now it's small offices
ÿÿÿ and home offices. People can carry their laptops everywhere, and
ÿÿÿ those are their offices. The poster child of American prosperity
ÿÿÿ today is somebody with a laptop getting on an airplane. For a
ÿÿÿ telecom company like Lucent or Bell South (BLS), what that means
ÿÿÿ is that their job is moving from the central telephone office to the
ÿÿÿ customer premises. They're in the best position to take care of
ÿÿÿ networking stuff in the home anyway. After all, they make house
ÿÿÿ calls; they're the people who come and make your phone work.
ÿÿÿ Maintaining things like home networks will become the locus of
ÿÿÿ tomorrow's communications companies. If the local telephone
ÿÿÿ companies ever become well-managed, they could be really
ÿÿÿ dangerous [laughs].ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: What will the network of the future look like?
ÿÿÿ A: There will be copper and there will be fiber, there will be fixed
ÿÿÿ radio and mobile and satellite, and each one will fill its own niche. On
ÿÿÿ top of these there will be a variety of protocols. No one size fits all.
ÿÿÿ There will be a lot of complexity, and your machines will attach to
ÿÿÿ whatever is out there. You will see the emergence of things like
ÿÿÿ bandwidth-on-demand, where you can share a pipe and get the
ÿÿÿ bandwidth you need. But Internet Protocol [the software lingua
ÿÿÿ franca of the Net] isn't going to solve every problem. Not all of this
ÿÿÿ stuff is going to be handled by a single goddamn Internet Protocol
ÿÿÿ network.
ÿÿÿ Q: Who said it would be?
ÿÿÿ A: Well, John Chambers [CEO of Cisco Systems (CSCO)] says the
ÿÿÿ telephone is a dinosaur. He's a great man, but his mentality is that
ÿÿÿ you should get rid of your phone and use your computer instead.
ÿÿÿ Give me a break. The telephone is convenient, it works, it goes in
ÿÿÿ your pocket. The mistake he's making is to think that the world is
ÿÿÿ going to be a neater place, that Internet Protocol will do everything. I
ÿÿÿ think it'll be quite the opposite. Things are getting more diverse.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: Can you give me some examples of that?
ÿÿÿ A: You are going to see other protocols for things like channelized
ÿÿÿ data, where you want your own pipe or you need more security. And
ÿÿÿ you are going to see a multiplicity of devices, not a blurring. You
ÿÿÿ don't want to watch video on your cell phone. Within five years,
ÿÿÿ every new car in the world will have a satellite antenna that lets it
ÿÿÿ receive 500 radio stations and six to eight hours of storage for saving
ÿÿÿ programs. And think what your life will be like when a TiVo box [a
ÿÿÿ digital video recorder] will be able to store 3,000 hours of video
ÿÿÿ instead of 30. All of these different devices will use various kinds of
ÿÿÿ networking technology.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: So what is the hottest area you are looking at now?
ÿÿÿ A: I'd say metropolitan area networking. There are lots of companies
ÿÿÿ making gigabit Ethernet equipment, and on the other side, outfits like
ÿÿÿ Global Crossing (GBLX) and Qwest (QWST) that have huge data
ÿÿÿ pipes. But people don't understand that these two worlds don't
ÿÿÿ connect very well today. It's the part of the python where the pig is
ÿÿÿ stuck. So I'm looking at a portfolio of companies that are taking a
ÿÿÿ fresh look at how to weave together these two worlds. Companies
ÿÿÿ like Mayan Networks, LuxN, Astral Point, and Quantum Bridge.
ÿÿÿ They're throwing electronics at the problem, collapsing everything
ÿÿÿ together to improve the connection between local area networks and
ÿÿÿ the backbone.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: What's the biggest trend you see overall in the computer
ÿÿÿ business?
ÿÿÿ A: The move from products to services. The only way people are
ÿÿÿ going to be able to make money is on the service side. The margins
ÿÿÿ in the PC business are gone; there's no value in stuffing boards. Even
ÿÿÿ Michael Dell could finally work himself out of a job. He makes only
ÿÿÿ $200 off a computer that costs its buyer $20,000 in service and
ÿÿÿ support over the life of the machine. He has to find a way to grab the
ÿÿÿ other 99% of the value of each machine his company sells. You have
ÿÿÿ to keep reinventing yourself.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: Are there any other technical trends people aren't aware of
ÿÿÿ yet?
ÿÿÿ A: There is tremendous stuff going on with electronic displays. Right
ÿÿÿ now, display panels cost around $1,000. But people are figuring out
ÿÿÿ how to make them as thin and flexible as a plastic vegetable bag.
ÿÿÿ Imagine what that will mean. You will be able to hang them on your
ÿÿÿ walls just like posters. Displays will be so cheap that packages will
ÿÿÿ have their own displays.ÿ
ÿÿÿ Q: What's the biggest difference that you've noticed between
ÿÿÿ the East and West Coast high tech businesses?
ÿÿÿ A: There is a tremendous amount of diversity here. But
ÿÿÿ probably the most important difference is in the work style.
ÿÿÿ People out here are less worried about failure than they are
ÿÿÿ back East. Even the venture capitalists are different: They use
ÿÿÿ the same words, but they tend to be more conservative in the
ÿÿÿ East. I saw that when I came out to learn about startups for
ÿÿÿ Lucent. When you are farther away, it's easier to deny what's
ÿÿÿ happening here. But there is a tremendous amount going on.ÿ
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Message #15718 from Bob Howarth at Dec 14 1999 4:21PM
Hey Z. The Morgan Stanley Research Report on NN says that ATM will be replaced by IP, with QOS in ATM replaced via something else in IP. I remember following
this, via I think it was called RSVP, several years ago, but it was all hype. Can you summarize the QOS issue, in your opinion, as it seemed to me back then that
QOS via ATM was the real jewel for ATM.
Thanks in advance.
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