Malavalli Kumar (Kumar Malavalli)

Malavalli Kumar (Kumar Malavalli)

Kumar Malavalli is the famous American entrepreneur of the Indian origin. One of pioneers in development of revolutionary Fibre Channel technology, in many respects thanks to which arose the multi-billion market of the storage area networks (SAN). Co-founder and ex-technical director of the company of Brocade.

Biography

The surname of Malavalli repeats the name of the small small village located nearby (Mandya district) from the Indian city of Mysore in which Kumar was born. In the childhood often listened to the records "Beatles" with the younger brothers of Prof. Shivaram Malavalli and Dr. Seetharam Malavalli.

Kumar graduate of Maysorsky National engineering Institute. Received two degrees - in physics and engineering.

In 1971 Kumar married the local girl and at once went to Germany for occupations at Inzhinerny institute in Düsseldorf at the rate of industrial electronics. Later Kumar for a while returned to Mysore, but in 1974 emigrated with the wife and the daughter to Canada.

Nearly 20 years Kumar worked in HP, did not decide to start own business yet. Kumar Malavalli was the chairman of technical committee ANSI INCITS T11 when this committee developed specifications for the Fibre Channel. Malavalli developed the first 4 standards of Fibre Channel technology.

Malavalli became the cofounder and the chairman of FCIA association (Fibre Channel Industry Association). Also he acted as the founder and became the chairman of SNIA (Storage Networking Industry Association).

In 1995 Kumar was among cofounders of Brocade Communications Systems company which became the leader in storage systems (DWH). He founded several other companies.

Kumar Malavalli remains an investor in many startups in Silicon Valley.