New player enters data center market

With cutting edge technology and a government contracting veteran at the helm, Liquid Computing Inc. is making a concerted push into the federal market.

One of the first steps was hiring Tom Kreidler as president of the federal unit. He brings experience working in the government market from Sun Microsystems Inc. and Juniper Networks Inc.

Another step was structuring the federal unit as a wholly owned subsidiary since Liquid Computing is a Canadian company. On the board of the subsidiary is James Muldoon, an Air Force veteran and chief executive officer of Metcor Inc.; and Dendy Young, former chief executive officer and chairman of GTSI Inc. Kreidler also is a board member.

The company's strategy is built around its fabric-based computing technology, which aids in server virtualization. The technology eliminates the need for much of the cabling and switches needed to operate multiple servers in a data center. The servers can be better managed, reducing the number of servers needed and lowering energy costs.

Kreidler said his job will be to build relationships with large systems integrators and to build awareness among government end-users.

The technology can be used by scientific and engineering users who need high-performance computing power and by data centers that process a large volume of transactions, he said.

The company also knows it has a finite window to gain market share in the government space until its much larger competitors ? Cisco Systems Inc., IBM Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Sun catch up. All of them are working on similar switching technologies, but are probably two years from market, Kreidler said.

The company's first government customer is the Army High Performance Computing Research Center. Liquid Computing also is talking to NASA about a demonstration project for the technology, he said.