Pope Joins Hammerhead
Mahi Networks Inc. founder Kevin Pope has landed a new gig with Hammerhead Systems Inc.
Pope will take over as VP of engineering for Hammerhead, nearly the same title he held at Mahi. No word on whether he's being assigned a company car.
Pope was excommunicated when Mahi erased most of its Petaluma, Calif., operations, ditching its original Mi7 product to concentrate on the Vx7 reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM), technology garnered in the acquisition of Photuris Networks' assets (see Mahi Restructures & Swims East and Mahi Nabs $70M, Photuris Assets).
Hammerhead, meanwhile, wants to put a renewed focus on operations. The company has no announced customers but is in several trials with major carriers and is within months of getting a system into a U.S. carrier's live network, according to CEO Peter Savage.
"We have a significant ramp ahead of us in system builds," snarls Savage. (In the meantime, Hammerhead can keep making technology announcements -- see Hammerhead Cries XML). Help in the sales corner is likely coming from Fujitsu Ltd. (Tokyo: 6702; London: FUJ), which signed a reseller deal with Hammerhead last year. "The HSX was anointed 'Flashwave 6400' by Fujitsu at Supercomm 2005, indicating that Fujitsu is prepping it for Tier 1 accounts," writes Heavy Reading analyst Scott Clavenna in a recent report, "The Future of Multiservice Switching in Converged IP/MPLS Networks." (See Hammerhead & Fujitsu Team up and Switches Face IP Challenge.)
All that activity puts greater emphasis on operations, as opposed to product development. So Hammerhead is moving Kim Holmes, vice president of engineering and operations, to just the operations role, with Pope taking on the VP engineering title.
There's some connection. Mahi's Mi7 was an optical aggregation box handling multiple protocols and performing STS-1 grooming. Hammerhead is developing a multiservice aggregation box, too, with emphasis on using pseudowires to link access traffic to an IP/MPLS core. And it walks on water, according to the marketing department.
A more obvious connection is that Pope worked with Savage at Applied Digital Access, an early 90s company that developed monitoring equipment targeted at carrier points of presence.
Pope's arrival continues the parade of execs through Hammerhead. With the decision to focus on pseudowires rather than edge switching, the company has seen its share of turnover, with senior technical officers departing in June 2004 and Savage taking the CEO chair nine months ago. (See Hammerhead Retools MPLS Approach, Hammerhead Founder Steps Aside, Hammerhead Orders Dry Martini, and Hammerhead Names New CEO.)
Hammerhead is up to 77 employees with plans to add 24 more, Savage says.
— Craig Matsumoto, Senior Editor, Light Reading
Pope will take over as VP of engineering for Hammerhead, nearly the same title he held at Mahi. No word on whether he's being assigned a company car.
Pope was excommunicated when Mahi erased most of its Petaluma, Calif., operations, ditching its original Mi7 product to concentrate on the Vx7 reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM), technology garnered in the acquisition of Photuris Networks' assets (see Mahi Restructures & Swims East and Mahi Nabs $70M, Photuris Assets).
Hammerhead, meanwhile, wants to put a renewed focus on operations. The company has no announced customers but is in several trials with major carriers and is within months of getting a system into a U.S. carrier's live network, according to CEO Peter Savage.
"We have a significant ramp ahead of us in system builds," snarls Savage. (In the meantime, Hammerhead can keep making technology announcements -- see Hammerhead Cries XML). Help in the sales corner is likely coming from Fujitsu Ltd. (Tokyo: 6702; London: FUJ), which signed a reseller deal with Hammerhead last year. "The HSX was anointed 'Flashwave 6400' by Fujitsu at Supercomm 2005, indicating that Fujitsu is prepping it for Tier 1 accounts," writes Heavy Reading analyst Scott Clavenna in a recent report, "The Future of Multiservice Switching in Converged IP/MPLS Networks." (See Hammerhead & Fujitsu Team up and Switches Face IP Challenge.)
All that activity puts greater emphasis on operations, as opposed to product development. So Hammerhead is moving Kim Holmes, vice president of engineering and operations, to just the operations role, with Pope taking on the VP engineering title.
There's some connection. Mahi's Mi7 was an optical aggregation box handling multiple protocols and performing STS-1 grooming. Hammerhead is developing a multiservice aggregation box, too, with emphasis on using pseudowires to link access traffic to an IP/MPLS core. And it walks on water, according to the marketing department.
A more obvious connection is that Pope worked with Savage at Applied Digital Access, an early 90s company that developed monitoring equipment targeted at carrier points of presence.
Pope's arrival continues the parade of execs through Hammerhead. With the decision to focus on pseudowires rather than edge switching, the company has seen its share of turnover, with senior technical officers departing in June 2004 and Savage taking the CEO chair nine months ago. (See Hammerhead Retools MPLS Approach, Hammerhead Founder Steps Aside, Hammerhead Orders Dry Martini, and Hammerhead Names New CEO.)
Hammerhead is up to 77 employees with plans to add 24 more, Savage says.
— Craig Matsumoto, Senior Editor, Light Reading

wriggly
12/5/2012 | 3:02:30 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
"snarls Savage"????? Pwho snarls??? Do you refer to trailer parks as pristine too? Praise or rip on who you want, but try to keep it professional. Or maybe I'm wrong? Is this a web tabloid like page six?
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Larry, Monkey
12/5/2012 | 3:02:29 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
uncle wriggly:editorial license. you, sir, have no sense of humor.
kopy chief
Pete Baldwin
12/5/2012 | 3:02:21 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
Wriggly -- Sorry if you found the Savage remark too savage. He's a nice guy, actually. But:1) I can't believe this bothers you more than the Pope remarks (poor Kevin Pope is probably just rolling his eyes and thinking "What is this, third grade?")
2) Not recognizing your handle, so I presume you're new. In five years we've written much, much bigger things to get upset about, so: Welcome, and please have a look around.
Sisyphus
12/5/2012 | 3:02:19 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
I was just surprised the "Mahi" and "Hammerhead" food pyramid angle wasn't exploite more...
"Hammerhead nibs at Mahi Management" would have been a good one. Or so I thought (geekishly smiling to himself).
firstmile
12/5/2012 | 3:02:16 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
I love that one too!But i really liked the "popemobile" photo link!
And by the way...Savage is known to snarl.
...first
tigre
12/5/2012 | 3:02:15 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
I've had business dealings with Savage on a couple of occasions and my experience is:1. Very impressed with himself for having been CEO of ADA (quite a while ago)
2. Record short tenure as CEO of Hatteras
3. Now CEO of a company that he has no background in it's space
4. Very unpleasnt character. While generally I have found graduates of Annapolis live up yo their reputation of being gentlemen, he comes off as a very rigid, military type
Tigre
firstmile
12/5/2012 | 3:02:15 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
Great Uncle Wriggley,Get a life...and back off on the caffiene.
Maybe that's why when I think of the company Hammerhead I never think of the shark...instead I think of the adjective.
...first
OpticOm
12/5/2012 | 3:02:12 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
Can save Hammerhead...Not worth the time to elaborate...
wriggly
12/5/2012 | 3:02:02 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
firstmile - the educated folks spell caffeine correctly. Get an education.
zoinks!
12/5/2012 | 3:01:54 AM
re: Pope Joins Hammerhead
wriggly spurted: firstmile - the educated folks spell caffeine correctly. Get an education.Definitely a newbie. Do you haunt chatrooms, alt.sex and other newsgroups correcting everyone's spelling and grammar?
Correcting spelling and grammar on boards is so ... 90s.
Zoinks!
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