Kunle Olukotun
Co-founder and Chief Technologist of SambaNova; Cadence Design Professor at Stanford University
- Co-founder and Chief Technologist, SambaNova231
- Cadence Design Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; Director of the Pervasive Parallelism Lab, Stanford University12
Kunle Olukotun is a co-founder and the Chief Technologist of SambaNova, which builds dataflow chips and systems for AI, and the Cadence Design Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Stanford University. Olukotun led the Stanford Hydra chip multiprocessor project, founded Afara Websystems, whose Niagara multicore processor was acquired by Sun Microsystems, and directs Stanford's Pervasive Parallelism Lab.12
Research
Olukotun's research centers on multicore and parallel processor design. Olukotun led the Stanford Hydra chip multiprocessor research project and, as director of the Pervasive Parallelism Lab, works on infrastructure for usable machine learning, including as a co-leader of the DAWN research program.125
Stanford's profile lists Olukotun as an ACM Fellow and an IEEE Fellow, the latter for contributions to chip multiprocessor design and its commercialization.1
Companies
Olukotun founded Afara Websystems to build high-throughput, low-power multicore server processors; Sun Microsystems acquired the company in 2002, and its Niagara processor went on to power SPARC-based servers.12
In 2017 Olukotun co-founded SambaNova with Stanford colleague Christopher Ré and semiconductor executive Rodrigo Liang. SambaNova describes Olukotun's chip multiprocessor work and Ré's machine learning systems work as the two starting points for the company, where Olukotun leads as Chief Technologist.31
Work
Niagara multicore processor
Founded Afara Websystems to build the Niagara high-throughput, low-power multicore server processor, which was acquired by Sun Microsystems and went on to power SPARC-based servers.12
SambaNova SN40L (external site: arxiv.org)
Co-author of the 2024 paper describing SambaNova's SN40L dataflow accelerator and its approach to the AI memory wall through dataflow and a composition of experts.4
Stanford DAWN project (external site: arxiv.org)
Co-author, with Peter Bailis, Christopher Ré and Matei Zaharia, of the 2017 paper laying out the Stanford DAWN research program on infrastructure for usable machine learning.5
Career timeline
2002
Afara Websystems, which Olukotun founded, was acquired by Sun Microsystems.2
2017
Co-founded SambaNova Systems with Christopher Ré and Rodrigo Liang.13
May 22, 2017
Co-authored the paper introducing the Stanford DAWN project on infrastructure for usable machine learning.5
May 13, 2024
Co-authored the SambaNova SN40L paper on dataflow and composition of experts.4
Other documented roles
Roles the sources document but that are not confirmed as current.
Honors and recognition
- ACM Fellow · Association for Computing Machinery, 20071
- IEEE Fellow · Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 20071
- Harry H. Goode Memorial Award · IEEE Computer Society, 20181
- Member of the National Academy of Engineering · National Academy of Engineering, 20211
- Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences · American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 20221
- Eckert-Mauchly Award · ACM and IEEE Computer Society, 20231
Related people
More sourced profiles at the same organization, in the same field, or from the same school.
- Rodrigo LiangAlso at SambaNova
- Aaron TeoInference and serving
- Abigail SeeAlso from Stanford
- Andrew FeldmanChips and hardware
- Abubakar AbidAlso from Stanford
- Azalia MirhoseiniAlso from Stanford
- Albert GuAlso from Stanford
- Bill DallyAlso from Stanford
- Andrej KarpathyAlso from Stanford
- Byron HsuTraining systems
- Andrew NgAlso from Stanford
- Chase LochmillerChips and hardware
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