Bikash Koley, currently finishing his last few weeks as CTO of Juniper, will be responsible for everything networking at Google, from inter-cluster communications to campus to WAN to intercontinental subsea cables.

Mitch Wagner, Executive Editor, Light Reading

December 5, 2019

2 Min Read
Koley Needs to Make Google Work Properly – No Pressure, Then

Google's incoming networking head, Bikash Koley, sent us a quick message outlining his responsibilities, and they're enough to keep him busy."I'll take ownership of everything networking at Google outside of the clusters, which are really part of Google's compute [infrastructure]," says Koley, currently finishing out his term as CTO at Juniper through January 3. He then returns to Google, where he previously worked for nearly ten years, as VP and head of global networking.That's an impressive title, and Koley's responsibilities match it -- from inter-cluster communication to intercontinental subsea cables, and everything in between.His mandate includes everything related to inter-cluster connectivity, campus networking, data center interconnectivity, WAN, edge networking, physical infrastructure such as submarine cables, fiber, peering and POPs, optical networking, and the interconnects powering all of Google's services, including search, ads, YouTube, Gmail and Google Cloud. Additionally, Koley and his team will be responsible for "Google's massive IT/corporate networks," he says.That's a lot of work.Google is depending on Koley and his networking team to keep the business running; if they mess up, Google fails.No pressure.Learn more about how the cloud is transforming the service provider sector at Light Reading's cloud content channel.We asked Koley what new goals and big projects he expects to implement at Google. He said he's been away from Google for two and a half years, and needs to catch up on its many changes.Why this matters

Google and other hypercloud providers have led the way in high-performance global networking for a decade. The hypercloud providers have built their networks, like their data centers, on commodity hardware and open source software, and service providers are following that example, using technology pioneered by Google and other hyperclouds. So Koley will be responsible for setting direction not just for Google, but for the networking industry as a whole.Also, enterprises and consumers are demanding that their service providers connect them to Google and other cloud platforms. That connectivity is becoming essential to the services that carriers provide to their customers. And carriers are partnering with hypercloud providers to deliver services: for example, Amazon Web Services this week announced high-profile partnerships with Verizon, Vodafone, SK Telecom and KDDI for Amazon's new AWS Wavelength 5G edge computing platform.Related posts:Google Names Juniper CTO Koley as Networking BossGoogle Cloud offers 'intelligence' for virtual networksGoogle & Facebook's Wireless Networking Ambitions Meet in PeruGoogle Steps Up Enterprise Networking – Get Ready to Panic— Mitch Wagner  Executive Editor, Light Reading

About the Author(s)

Mitch Wagner

Executive Editor, Light Reading

San Diego-based Mitch Wagner is many things. As well as being "our guy" on the West Coast (of the US, not Scotland, or anywhere else with indifferent meteorological conditions), he's a husband (to his wife), dissatisfied Democrat, American (so he could be President some day), nonobservant Jew, and science fiction fan. Not necessarily in that order.

He's also one half of a special duo, along with Minnie, who is the co-habitor of the West Coast Bureau and Light Reading's primary chewer of sticks, though she is not the only one on the team who regularly munches on bark.

Wagner, whose previous positions include Editor-in-Chief at Internet Evolution and Executive Editor at InformationWeek, will be responsible for tracking and reporting on developments in Silicon Valley and other US West Coast hotspots of communications technology innovation.

Beats: Software-defined networking (SDN), network functions virtualization (NFV), IP networking, and colored foods (such as 'green rice').

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