1. Kumar Sreekanti
CTO, Head of Software
Hewlett Packard Enterprise

There’s a reason why Sreekanti is referred to as “the professor” inside HPE. That’s because of the software smarts and intelligence he has brought to bear to drive HPE’s cloud-native, software-defined edge-to-cloud Platform-as-a-Service strategy.

HPE President and CEO Antonio Neri hand-picked Sreekanti, whose impressive software chops delivered a big artificial intelligence breakthrough at BlueData (acquired by HPE in 2018), to do dual duty as both chief technology officer and head of software. That puts Sreekanti in charge of 3,800 talented HPE software developers tasked with delivering the flat-out best container experience for customers.

Sreekanti—who was CTO for HPE’s hybrid IT business before taking on the bigger software job in May—has brought an architectural clarity and simplicity to the HPE cloud-native, software-defined stack.

At the HPE Discover Virtual Experience event, Sreekanti made his debut as the new software boss with the launch of the blockbuster Ezmeral container platform that is already turning the heads of partners and customers for its artificial intelligence and machine-learning superiority.

Sreekanti’s new software-defined stack is sure to give fits to Amazon Web Services, VMware and Red Hat. That’s a lesson plan sure to get an “A” from the professor.