Gururaj S. Rao

Designer of Systems Leadership functions that differentiated S/390 from its competition, Rao is personally credited with IBM's mainframe resurrection. His team successfully implemented IBM's breakthrough copper interconnect technology to set a new industry standard in semiconductors. Born in India, he received his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Mysore. He then received an M.S. degree from the Indian Institute of Science before coming to the U.S. for a Ph.D. from Stanford.

He taught Electrical Engineering at Rice University before joining IBM in 1978. Rao quickly distinguished himself as a superior engineer, with a mind capable of grasping the design pathways most likely to lead to long-term competitive advantages. He worked through the decline and rebirth of the mainframe during the 1980s and early 1990s as a key technical leader who was responsible for the mainframe's resurrection.

As leader of the design and implementation of Systems Leadership functions aimed at differentiating S/390 from its competition, he was personally responsible for such functions as the Asynchronous Data Mover and S/390 data compression. He also contributed the high-level design for the S/390 Parallel Query Server and played a leading role in developing new system architectures that exploited advances in hardware and software technologies.

His title has been Systems Chief Engineer, IBM Systems & Technology Group, where Rao has been responsible for establishing the technical direction for IBM's enterprise systems. He led an inter-divisional team of hardware, software, and research engineers. Working with enterprise customers and IBM's client-facing units, he determined business and customer needs and drove the design of IBM's enterprise systems to meet those needs.

He was named an IBM Fellow in 1969—the highest honor a scientist, engineer, or programmer at IBM can achieve. IBM credited Rao with the vision and perseverance needed to return the S/390 back to center stage and IBM to a leadership position in this market. He was named Asian American Engineer of the Year in 2008.