BUSINESSWEEK ONLINE : JANUARY 8, 2001 ISSUE
THE TOP 25 MANAGERS -- MANAGERS TO WATCH Daniel J. Warmenhoven, Network Appliance Daniel J. Warmenhoven, the chief executive of eight-year-old Network Appliance Inc. (NTAP), may be reprising the role of John Chambers. A decade ago Chambers' Cisco Systems Corp. (CSCO) began beating up on IBM (IBM) with faster, cheaper ways to tie computers together. Now, Warmenhoven is poised for a similar run against mighty rival EMC Corp. (EMC) A veteran of IBM himself and also Hewlett-Packard Co. (HWP), Warmenhoven, 50, is brilliantly executing a strategy to exploit a more cost- effective way to store and distribute computer files. While EMC sells $1 million-plus, mainframe-style products that store files and Net traffic, NetApp makes under-$200,000 devices for particular storage jobs--say, caching Net content. Under Warmenhoven's leadership, NetApp has posted 20 straight quarters of 70%-plus growth. ''We kick their butt all the time,'' he says. For its part, EMC says it'll overtake NetApp in its core market by 2002. Warmenhoven's strength is coupling Net-style hypergrowth with old-school business discipline. He has religiously invested in sales to capture more of the booming storage business. Says Merrill Lynch & Co. analyst Steve Milunovich: ''He's not some dot-com guy, going for the short term. He's building for the long term.'' And that may be a problem for EMC. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ BACK TO TOP					The Top 25 Managers The Managers to Watch The Best Regulators The Top Entrepreneurs The Losers and the Dot-Conned INTERACT E-Mail to Business Week Online

Copyright 2000-2008, by The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved. Terms of Use   Privacy Notice