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Jill Yaoz, President, AFCOM
Jill Yaoz is the President of AFCOM, an association devoted to providing education and resources for data center managers since 1980. Since joining AFCOM in 1992, membership has risen 166 percent to 4,000, and AFCOM's Data Center World® conferences have experienced phenomenal growth and industry recognition. As President, Mrs. Yaoz is responsible for the overall operation of the association, including membership, publications, marketing, sales, conferences and trade shows. She directs AFCOM's strategic partner and chapter programs, overseas initiatives, and, as Board Chair, oversees activities undertaken by AFCOM's Data Center Institute, a strategic industry think-tank. Under Mrs. Yaoz's leadership, Data Center World conferences have enjoyed award-winning growth; Tradeshow Week named Data Center World as one of its fastest growing tradeshows in 2006, 2007, and 2008. The recent addition of new AFCOM chapters raises the global total to more than 40, up from just six in 2003, and illustrates her commitment to supporting data center professionals at local and regional levels throughout the globe. Mrs. Yaoz also serves as Executive Editor of Data Center Management Magazine, AFCOM's in-house data center industry publication. She oversees the editorial direction and content of the publication, and enjoys contributing to each issue. Under her direction, the publication was named a runner up for min's Editorial & Design Awards. Mrs. Yaoz is frequently sought by the press for her perspective on industry news and trends, and has been quoted in such mainstream and industry publications as Computerworld, InformationWeek, Network World, eWEEK, Mission Critical, CIO, The New York Times and Wall Street Journal. For more than 30 years, AFCOM has been based in Orange County since its inception. Mrs. Yaoz is proud to be a part of the community, and is pleased to provide jobs to several local residents.

 

 

Leonard Eckhaus, Founder
Leonard Eckhaus is the founder of AFCOM. For more than 30 years he has been instrumental in raising the computer industry's awareness of data center management's critical role in the overall success of the company. Mr. Eckhaus is also founder and past chairman of the Data Center Institute, a council of leading industry vendors and data center managers working together to examine, research and develop positions on industry trends relative to data center and e-business issues. Prior to founding AFCOM, Mr. Eckhaus was himself a data center manager for such public and private organizations as IBM, TRW and the Los Angeles County Superintendent of Schools. He has served on the Curriculum Advisory Board at the National Technical Institute of for the Deaf, authored numerous articles on Data Center Management and has been quoted frequently in such publications as Computerworld, InformationWeek, Datamation, U.S. News & World Report, The Washington Post, The Wall St. Journal, The New York Times and many more.

 

 

Paul Greenley, Senior Data Center Consultant, BELL CANADA
Paul Greenley has more than 30 years of data center operations experience in running, outsourcing, and delivering data center services as well as managing, directing and conducting strategic planning for disaster recovery plans. He has worked across the globe, including many years in the government in the U.K., and with large companies in Canada and the U.S. Mr. Greenley has vast experience in managing, building and designing data centers and also running multiple locations worldwide. He is a highly motivated individual, driven by challenge and motivated by results and cost savings. He has spoken at many data center events, including the data center summit in New York and most recently the Data Center dynamics event in Toronto where he facilitated a panel of data center managers on build- design strategies and green data center techniques. Paul Greenley currently sits on the board of directors for AFCOM's Data Center Institute.

 

 

 

Tad Davies, Executive Vice President, Bick Group
Approaching 25 years of experience in the data center services industry, Tad Davies leads teams that ensure customers gain the most value from their data center investments, physical and IT, and that those investments are in line with business needs. Since 1987, Mr. Davies has focused on data center strategies and consults regularly with executive teams in the U.S. and internationally in both the public and private sectors. He has been praised for his collaborative approach to solving business issues and has been involved in the planning and construction of millions of square feet of data center space. He regularly speaks at tradeshows and corporate events across the country. Tad Davies, born in Melbourne, Australia, earned a Bachelor of Science degree in management from Tulane University's Business School.

 

 

Richard Sawyer, Worldwide Practice Leader, Critical Facilities Assurance, HP Critical Facilities Services
Richard Sawyer is a senior principal leading the worldwide practice in critical facilities assurance, which provides commissioning, operational consulting, and assessment services for data centers. His expertise includes project design, equipment specification and selection, contracting, testing, performance measurement and national engineering standards for global data center development. Mr. Sawyer has operated data centers for CIGNA and AETNA, developed data centers in Japan, Brazil and Argentina, and lead construction and commissioning of major mission critical facilities in the U.S. Richard Sawyer is a frequent presenter at AFCOM Data Center World Conferences and a board member of the AFCOM Data Center Institute.

 

 

Jack Story, Chief Technology Officer, Infocrossing, a Wipro Company
Jack Story is chief technology officer for Infocrossing, a Wipro Company. He is responsible for establishing and directing the technology leadership for Infocrossing. These responsibilities cover the strategy for Infocrossing's data centers as well as strategic planning, technology innovation, and thought leadership. Prior to Infocrossing, Mr. Story served as a chief technologist for EDS in its infrastructure service lines. He serves on numerous advisory councils and has spoken at technology seminars. He holds a Master of Science in information technology from Golden Gate University and a Bachelor of Science in biology from Lambuth University.

 

Randy J. Ortiz, Director, Data Center Design and Engineering, Internap Network Services
Randy J. Ortiz is a veteran of the data center design and construction industry, having successfully designed and managed over 1 million square feet of mission critical space. At Internap, he oversees development of its data centers worldwide, including state-of-the art "green" and high-density power facilities. Prior to Internap, Ortiz was president and executive editor of Data Center Journal. Throughout his career, he has performed large-scale design projects within a range of sectors, including financial services, pharmaceutical and real estate.

 

 

Sam Somashekar, Vice President of Marketing and Business Development, Kaavo
Sam Somashekar is responsible for leading all marketing and business development initiatives at Kaavo. These include driving strategic partnerships, product marketing, product management, thought leadership and industry presence. He has more than 17 years of experience demonstrating success in enterprise product management and development, market research and strategy, marketing and business development. Prior to Kaavo, Mr. Somashekar held various senior management roles at public and private companies, including senior director of product management at CA Technologies (a leading IT management software and solutions company). At CA, his responsibilities included creating and managing global product strategy for key industry areas such as cloud computing, data center automation, service automation, and green IT. Throughout his career Mr. Somashekar has provided leadership and vision to increase both top line and bottom line growth, maximizing profitability while addressing challenging and realistic problems. He holds a B.A. in computer science from New York University and is Pragmatic Marketing Certified. He has authored several articles and whitepapers on the subject of enterprise IT management. Sam Somashekar has also been quoted in articles appearing in leading industry publications such as InfoWorld and Computerworld and has been a regular speaker at industry events.

 

 

 

Tim Hazzard, President, Methode Electronics – Data Solutions Group
Tim Hazzard is the president of Methode Electronics Data Solutions Group. He has more than 20 years of experience in the data center industry focused on IT outsourcing and infrastructure solutions. The Data Solutions Group is comprised of five companies (Connectivity Technologies Incorporated, dataMate, Methode Development Corp., Optokon and Automated Intelligent Solutions) providing innovation, manufacturing and IT Infrastructure services around the globe. Prior to joining Methode in 2007, Mr. Hazzard developed and managed the global data center services program for applications and web hosting at Electronic Data Systems. This program provided automated solutions for managing mission critical application and web environments.

 

 

Scott Steele, Senior Vice President, NER Data Corporation
Scott Steele is senior vice president at NER Data. His responsibilities with NER include overseeing business activities for multiple areas within NER Data including managed services, marketing, business development and strategy development. Mr. Steele has an extensive background in creating efficiencies and reducing total cost of ownership within the IT infrastructure. He has more than 15 years experience in providing effective solutions for customers including general management, sales management, marketing management, business development, and product and market development with several technology companies. NER's IT practice in the data center excels by using a framework of industry recognized best practices, current metrics, modeling, and best-in-class products and services to provide optimization and a comprehensive solution for NER's clients. NER's managed services for print practice brings these same core competencies and results to a customer's print environment. In addition to his work with NER, Mr. Steele currently sits on the board of directors for the Data Center Institute.

 

 

James Simonelli, Senior Vice President, APC by Schneider Electric
Jim Simonelli is senior vice president and chief technology officer of APC. In 2007, Schneider Electric acquired APC and formed the Critical Power & Cooling Services (CPCS) Business Unit, which includes the APC and MGE UPS Systems brands. The CPCS Business Unit reported revenue of $3.5 billion in 2007 and employs 12,000 people worldwide. Schneider Electric, with 112,000 employees and operations in 190 countries, had 2007 annual sales of $25 billion. Appointed as CTO in December 2007, Mr. Simonelli is responsible for technology direction, product platform roadmaps and system architectures devoted to power, cooling, rack and infrastructure management software. He is currently the lead architect of APC's InfraStruXure® system, leading the effort to expand and enhance integrated data center infrastructure solutions. Prior to his role as CTO, Mr. Simonelli held multiple executive engineering positions with APC including vice president, system and platform architecture and vice president solutions delivery group. He is a frequent speaker at power electronics and information technology conferences. Prior to joining APC in 1991, he was employed at Digital Equipment Corporation where he worked in the power electronics design group developing switch mode power supplies and UPS equipment. Jim Simonelli received his BSEE and MSEE degrees from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) and holds 10 U.S. patents.

 

 

Mike Andrea, Director, The Strategic Directions Group
Mike Andrea is a director and data center national practice manager for The Strategic Directions Group, and is the external CIO for Springfield Land Corporation. He has over 23 years experience in the ICT industry, covering strategy, design and management across commercial and government sectors. In April 2010, Mr. Andrea was appointed to the board of directors of AFCOM's Data Center Institute in the U.S. and presented at AFCOM's Data Center World in March 2010. He has been Springfield's CIO since 2007 and is responsible for the ICT Master Plan for Greater Springfield, the 2010 World's Best Master Planned Community, which is an emerging city of 125,000 residents with sustainable, technology focused development underway in health, education, retail and commercial precincts. Mr. Andrea was the design authority on the $220M, 14,000sqm Tier 3+ Polaris Data Center that opened in January 2009 in Springfield, Queensland and is now a member of the Joint Venture Board. He has played key roles in advising and implementing business to technology realignment, financial feasibilities, supplier selection and vendor management, tenders, contract management and negotiation, solution development, ICT and data center facilities management, outsourcing and co-sourcing strategies, data center design, networking and telecommunications design for clients. Prior to joining Strategic Directions, Mr. Andrea was the national practice manager for Dimension Data's Connectivity Line of Business (covering communications, networking, VoIP, mobility and carrier solutions) where he provided management of a $100 million professional services business including business development, strategic planning and resource management. Prior to this, he was a senior business consultant in DiData focusing on telecommunications solutions, procurement and ICT facilities management outsourcing solutions. He was previously a communications consultant with Telstra where he was responsible for the solution, design and implementation of customized large-scale telecommunications, facilities management, and managed services solutions across corporate and Government sectors. Mr. Andrea holds the following positions: executive director, Strategic Directions Group Pty Ltd; CIO, Springfield Land Corporation and Joint Venture Board Member Design Authority & FM Auditor, Polaris Data Center at Springfield.

 

 

Tom Roberts, Manager, DC Facility Management, Trinity Information Services
As manager of data center facility management, Tom Roberts' responsibilities include the facility\infrastructure readiness of three corporate data centers and 25 hospital-based computer centers for Trinity Health. He also has responsibility for capacity planning and asset management for all the equipment located in the data and computer centers. Mr. Roberts has been employed by Trinity Health for 29 years. He worked as a master electrician in the electrical construction field for 11 years prior to working in healthcare. His current projects include evaluating the readiness of the hospital computer centers for the continued rollout of their common clinical, financial, and ERP applications for all Trinity Health hospitals and working on the short- and long-term strategic plans for all of the data and computer centers, which will involve consolidations and regionalization of the centers. Tom Roberts has been the president of the local Michigan AFCOM chapter for seven years and a member of the DCI board of directors for six years.

 

 

Donna Manley, IT Senior Director, University of Pennsylvania
Donna Manley is an IT senior director for the University of Pennsylvania's Information Systems and Computing (ISC) organization, managing its central administrative data center, the sole IVY League ISO 9001 certified data center for quality and associated service offerings. Involved in various information technology national and local organizations, she currently serves as president of the AFCOM Midlantic Chapter. With more than 20 years experience in the information systems field in both corporate and not-for-profit organizations, and skills in a wide variety of technology and business disciplines, Donna Manley has traditionally been brought in to transform organizations into more efficient operations. She has written for a number of leading healthcare publications and speaks locally and nationally on a variety of information systems topics including process improvement strategies. Currently, Donna Manley is authoring a book, "ITIL Assessment, Planning, and Management".

 

 

Scott Noteboom, Vice President, Global Data Center Infrastructure, Yahoo!, Inc.
Scott Noteboom serves as Yahoo!'s vice president of operations. Since joining Yahoo!, he has served as chief architect and founder of the companies data center self construct and operate initiatives. During this time Mr. Noteboom has led over 14x growth of the companies data center and compute footprint, with host counts installed and supported numbering in the multi hundred thousands. His duties include managing all aspects of the data center lifecycle from design, construction, installations, operations, to de-commissions. Mr. Noteboom has published numerous papers and articles, innovated multiple award winning technology patents, lectured many a classroom and has served as keynote speaker on the subjects of high performance, efficient large scale data center and compute platforms. Mr. Noteboom has more than 15 years experience in the engineering and design of data centers and computing platforms. Prior to joining Yahoo!, he was director of data centers at AboveNet. He also founded several start-ups in the Internet Service Provider (ISP), and Voice over IP (VOIP) space.