Cray's Ungaro profiled in The Register

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Cray’s CEO Pete Ungaro was profiled in The Register last week. It’s an interesting short read that touches on Cray’s odd position and a private company in which the US government has a large interest.

Cray remains a weird sort of public company. Federal funds keep it humming. So, when Washington is spooked and needs to craft some nuclear weapons or make a database to end all databases, Cray’s rolling in cash. And when the Feds cut supercomputing budgets, Cray feels the pinch more than other hardware makers who have other customers to pump for money.

That said, the over half of the company’s revenue come from overseas according to the article, and the interest in HPC from the business community could further diversify the company’s customer base. Regarding the future:

Other than a possible Xeon embrace, Cray has no major shockers in store for customers that it’s willing to discuss. “We are trying not be surprising,” Ungaro said. “When customers are spending multiple millions of dollars on a machine, they appreciate that consistency.”

Ok, so long as “not surprising me” doesn’t turn into “not trying to make HPC radically better than it is right now.”