A Conversation with Jonathan Schwartz

Jonathan Schwartz is chief executive officer and president of Sun Microsystems, and a member of Sun’s board of directors. He became Sun’s CEO in 2006, succeeding the Company’s co-founder and current chairman of the board, Scott McNealy.

Schwartz was promoted to president and chief operating officer in 2004, and managed all operational functions at Sun – from product development and marketing, to global sales and service. An inveterate communicator, Schwartz has led Sun’s drive to engage the marketplace, and redefine corporate transparency.

A leader behind many of Sun’s open source and standard setting initiatives, Jonathan’s been an outspoken advocate for the network as a utility with more than just value for the computing industry – but as a tool for driving economic, social and political progress.

Prior to his position as COO, Schwartz served as Sun’s executive vice president for software, its Chief Strategy Officer, and held a variety of leadership positions across product and corporate development. He joined Sun in 1996 after the Company acquired Lighthouse Design, where he was CEO and co-founder. Prior to that, Schwartz was with McKinsey & Co.

Schwartz received degrees in economics and mathematics from Wesleyan University.

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Tim O’Reilly is the founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media, Inc., thought by many to be the best computer book publisher in the world. O’Reilly Media also publishes online through the O’Reilly Network and hosts conferences on technology topics, including the O’Reilly Open Source Convention, the O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, and the Web 2.0 Conference. Tim’s blog, the O’Reilly Radar “watches the alpha geeks” to determine emerging technology trends, and serves as a platform for advocacy about issues of importance to the technical community. Tim is on the boards of MySQL, CollabNet, Safari Books Online, Wesabe, and ValuesOfN, and is a partner in O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures.

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