Brian Smith: Pioneering Innovation in Technology for Over 25 Years

Brian Smith (pictured above right with Marcia Elliot) commenced his journey as a system administrator during high school, establishing a groundwork for growth. His career path led to roles as a research assistant at Ames Laboratory, team lead on IBM’s BlueGene, and IBM Master Inventor showcasing pioneering technology skills. As a software developer at Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF) his high-performance computing contributions shone; while he displayed his adaptability as an HPC architect at Mellanox and his dedication to technology community support as Senior HPC Engineer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Today, as Director of Technology at Cornelis Networks, Brian leads with innovation and expertise.

A Loyal SC Committee Member

Brian Smith is a loyal SCinet volunteer, participating in numerous teams throughout the years. His first SC conference was in Orlando in 1998 and he has been to many more over the years. He has served on the Planning Committee a few times, usually in the Tech Program area as a reviewer for the Papers and Posters programs. He has been active in SCinet for the past 5 years and currently co-leads the Contributor Relations Team and the Logistics Team.

Brian Smith

Director of Technology, Cornelis Networks

Brian on LinkedIN

Q: What single event most made you realize you wanted a career in HPC/computing?

Smith: My first job in college was at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Ames Laboratory at the Scalable Computing Lab (SCL). Despite being a very small DOE lab, the SCL had a lot of high-end HPC hardware, including two MasPars, two NCubes, an Intel Paragon, and several large SGI multiprocessor machines. We built multiple “Beowulf” clusters as well and provided compute resources to other groups on the Iowa State University campus. Getting to play with such high-end hardware at the time made me realize I needed to stay in HPC.

Q: What do you consider your biggest contribution to the HPC/computing community?

Smith: I was a team leader for the IBM BlueGene L, P, and Q communication stacks. I really feel the BlueGene program was one of the best things in HPC in a long time and I’m very proud of my work on the project. We had a very balanced machine (memory per CPU, network per CPU, etc.) and pushed the envelope on a number of fronts, including a scalable messaging stack that is still being used in products today.

Q: What would you like to see change about, within, or among the HPC/computing community?

Smith: More diversity. HPC has gotten more diverse in the last 25+ years, but it still has a long way to go. The WINS program is a great program but we can definitely do more as a community.

Brian Smith (left) with fellow SCinet volunteer Wes DeWitt.

Brian Smith (right) with Marcia Elliot.