Jonathan I. Schwartz
Encyclopedia
Jonathan Ian Schwartz is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Picture of Health. He was formerly the President and CEO
of Sun Microsystems
prior to its acquisition by Oracle
, and previously the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Lighthouse Design, Ltd., a software company focused on Apple's NeXTSTEP platform.
in Bethesda, Maryland
. With aspirations of becoming an architect, in 1983 he entered college at Carnegie Mellon University
, and subsequently transferred to Wesleyan University
in 1984. At Wesleyan, he ran short of funds and was preparing to drop out, when a friend suggested he apply for a scholarship, the Gilbert Clee Scholarship. He was awarded the scholarship, which funded the remainder of his university expenses, and ultimately received received dual degrees in mathematics
and economics
.
He is of mixed origin, a fact he did not discover until late in his life. He is one quarter Indian
and one quarter Welsh
on his mother's side, and one quarter Hungarian, and one quarter Russian
on his father's side.
In 1986, Schwartz was nearly killed while riding on the Amtrak Colonial train that crashed in Chase, Maryland
. According to him, the incident had a profound impact on his life.
in New York City
, focused on serving consumer products and financial services companies. In 1989, Schwartz left McKinsey and moved to Chevy Chase, Maryland
, where he was a co-founder of Lighthouse Design
, a company focused on building software for Steve Jobs's NeXT Computer, Inc. In the early 1990s, Lighthouse Design moved to San Mateo, California
. Eventually, Schwartz became chief executive officer
of Lighthouse.
In 1996, with NeXT failing in the marketplace and the internet beginning to explode globally, Lighthouse Design
was acquired by Sun Microsystems
. Schwartz began his career at Sun working for Eric Schmidt, then the head of Sun's Laboratories. After Schimidt's departure for Novell, Schwartz became the director of product marketing for JavaSoft in 1997 and then transitioned through a series of vice president positions. In 2004, Schwartz was promoted to president and chief operating officer of Sun. He eventually replaced Scott McNealy
as CEO.
Sun's stock reached a high of $26.25 in 2007, a point just prior to which private equity investors KKR invested $750m dollars in a convertible debt financing. Toward the end of 2007, with nearly a third of its revenue derived from financial services companies, the global financial crisis hit Sun especially hard. With large customers going bankrupt across the world, Schwartz began looking for a buyer for Sun, apparently contravening the wishes of Sun's founder and Chairman, Scott McNealy, and stirring resentment among employees.
Schwartz ultimately finalized an acquisition a couple months later, when he signed an agreement for the sale of the company to Oracle Corporation
on April 20, 2009. Oracle had been Sun's largest ISV, and had a disproportionate ability to determine the competitiveness of Sun's offerings - Oracle was believed to have stepped in front of another buyer. The identify of that other bidder was subsequently determined in an FBI indictment to be IBM, whose executive, Bob Moffat, had been trading on news of the acquisition.
As CEO of Sun, Schwartz was known as one of the few Fortune 500 CEO bloggers, and is recognized for his efforts to bring greater transparency into the corporate world. He had a public exchange with SEC Chairman Christopher Cox about the use of websites and blogs for the dissemination of financial information to meet Regulation Fair Disclosure
. Schwartz generally believed the internet, and Sun's web presence on it, was a far more fair and efficient vehicle for the dissemination of Sun's financial information - as opposed to the expensive, and proprietary networks fostered by ratings agencies and the Wall Street Journal.
on Twitter that read as follows: "Financial crisis/Stalled too many customers/CEO no more."
On August 12, 2010, Schwartz was named to Taleo Corporation
's board of directors, on September 9, 2010 he announced founding a new company, Picture of Health.
On April 7, 2011, Schwartz was named to Silver Spring Network's board of directors; on October 26, 2011 he was named to the board of Moxie Software.
has given way to the "Participation Age", in which individuals connected to the network are both creators and consumers of news, ideas, and content. He has been an outspoken evangelist for technology as a social utility—comparable to electricity or railroads—that creates an opportunity to drive economic, political and societal progress. He has been a consistent lobbyist in Washington, DC on behalf of regulations that protect the ability of individuals to maintain rights on par with corporations in the protection and promotion of free speech and intellectual property protection.
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
of Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems, Inc. was a company that sold :computers, computer components, :computer software, and :information technology services. Sun was founded on February 24, 1982...
prior to its acquisition by Oracle
Oracle Corporation
Oracle Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation that specializes in developing and marketing hardware systems and enterprise software products – particularly database management systems...
, and previously the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Lighthouse Design, Ltd., a software company focused on Apple's NeXTSTEP platform.
Background
Schwartz was born in Southern California, and spent much of his childhood moving between America's West coast and its capital, Washington, DC. He ultimately graduated in 1983 from Bethesda-Chevy Chase High SchoolBethesda-Chevy Chase High School
Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School is a Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, public school named for two of the towns it serves along with Kensington and Silver Spring, Maryland. It is located at 4301 East-West Highway, in Bethesda, an unincorporated community in Montgomery County...
in Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda is a census designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House , which in turn took its name from Jerusalem's Pool of Bethesda...
. With aspirations of becoming an architect, in 1983 he entered college at Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States....
, and subsequently transferred to Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college founded in 1831 and located in Middletown, Connecticut. According to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Wesleyan is the only Baccalaureate College in the nation that emphasizes undergraduate instruction in the arts and...
in 1984. At Wesleyan, he ran short of funds and was preparing to drop out, when a friend suggested he apply for a scholarship, the Gilbert Clee Scholarship. He was awarded the scholarship, which funded the remainder of his university expenses, and ultimately received received dual degrees in mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
and economics
Economics
Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
.
He is of mixed origin, a fact he did not discover until late in his life. He is one quarter Indian
Non-resident Indian and Person of Indian Origin
A Non-Resident Indian is an Indian citizen who has migrated to another country, a person of Indian origin who is born outside India, or a person of Indian origin who resides permanently outside India. Other terms with the same meaning are overseas Indian and expatriate Indian...
and one quarter Welsh
Welsh people
The Welsh people are an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language.John Davies argues that the origin of the "Welsh nation" can be traced to the late 4th and early 5th centuries, following the Roman departure from Britain, although Brythonic Celtic languages seem to have...
on his mother's side, and one quarter Hungarian, and one quarter Russian
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
on his father's side.
In 1986, Schwartz was nearly killed while riding on the Amtrak Colonial train that crashed in Chase, Maryland
Chase, Maryland rail wreck
The Chase, Maryland train collision occurred at 1:04 pm on January 4, 1987, on Amtrak's Northeast Corridor main line in the Chase community in eastern Baltimore County, Maryland, United States, at Gunpow Interlocking, about northeast of Baltimore...
. According to him, the incident had a profound impact on his life.
Career
Schwartz started his career in 1987 at McKinsey & CompanyMcKinsey & Company
McKinsey & Company, Inc. is a global management consulting firm that focuses on solving issues of concern to senior management. McKinsey serves as an adviser to many businesses, governments, and institutions...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, focused on serving consumer products and financial services companies. In 1989, Schwartz left McKinsey and moved to Chevy Chase, Maryland
Chevy Chase, Maryland
Chevy Chase is the name of both a town and an unincorporated census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland. In addition, a number of villages in the same area of Montgomery County include "Chevy Chase" in their names...
, where he was a co-founder of Lighthouse Design
Lighthouse Design
Lighthouse Design Ltd. was an American software company that operated from 1989 to 1996. Lighthouse developed software for NeXT computers running the NeXTSTEP operating system. The company was founded in 1989 by Alan Chung, Roger Rosner, Jonathan Schwartz, Kevin Steele and Brian Skinner, in...
, a company focused on building software for Steve Jobs's NeXT Computer, Inc. In the early 1990s, Lighthouse Design moved to San Mateo, California
San Mateo, California
San Mateo is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of approximately 100,000 , it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City to the east, Belmont to the south,...
. Eventually, Schwartz became chief executive officer
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
of Lighthouse.
In 1996, with NeXT failing in the marketplace and the internet beginning to explode globally, Lighthouse Design
Lighthouse Design
Lighthouse Design Ltd. was an American software company that operated from 1989 to 1996. Lighthouse developed software for NeXT computers running the NeXTSTEP operating system. The company was founded in 1989 by Alan Chung, Roger Rosner, Jonathan Schwartz, Kevin Steele and Brian Skinner, in...
was acquired by Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems, Inc. was a company that sold :computers, computer components, :computer software, and :information technology services. Sun was founded on February 24, 1982...
. Schwartz began his career at Sun working for Eric Schmidt, then the head of Sun's Laboratories. After Schimidt's departure for Novell, Schwartz became the director of product marketing for JavaSoft in 1997 and then transitioned through a series of vice president positions. In 2004, Schwartz was promoted to president and chief operating officer of Sun. He eventually replaced Scott McNealy
Scott McNealy
Scott McNealy is an American business executive. He co-founded computer technology company Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Vinod Khosla, Bill Joy, and Andy Bechtolsheim.-Biography:...
as CEO.
As CEO of Sun
As CEO of Sun, he dramatically amplified Sun's historically tepid embrace of open source and freely distributed software, attempting to drive adoption, in particular, of Sun's operating system, Solaris. The demise of Solaris on Intel compatible x86 computers, he stated in subsequent interviews and blog postings, had entirely undermined the hardware platforms on which Sun depended for revenue - hardware systems that ran only Sun's Solaris.Sun's stock reached a high of $26.25 in 2007, a point just prior to which private equity investors KKR invested $750m dollars in a convertible debt financing. Toward the end of 2007, with nearly a third of its revenue derived from financial services companies, the global financial crisis hit Sun especially hard. With large customers going bankrupt across the world, Schwartz began looking for a buyer for Sun, apparently contravening the wishes of Sun's founder and Chairman, Scott McNealy, and stirring resentment among employees.
Schwartz ultimately finalized an acquisition a couple months later, when he signed an agreement for the sale of the company to Oracle Corporation
Oracle Corporation
Oracle Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation that specializes in developing and marketing hardware systems and enterprise software products – particularly database management systems...
on April 20, 2009. Oracle had been Sun's largest ISV, and had a disproportionate ability to determine the competitiveness of Sun's offerings - Oracle was believed to have stepped in front of another buyer. The identify of that other bidder was subsequently determined in an FBI indictment to be IBM, whose executive, Bob Moffat, had been trading on news of the acquisition.
As CEO of Sun, Schwartz was known as one of the few Fortune 500 CEO bloggers, and is recognized for his efforts to bring greater transparency into the corporate world. He had a public exchange with SEC Chairman Christopher Cox about the use of websites and blogs for the dissemination of financial information to meet Regulation Fair Disclosure
Regulation Fair Disclosure
Regulation Fair Disclosure, also commonly referred to as Regulation FD or Reg FD, is a regulation that was promulgated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in August 2000...
. Schwartz generally believed the internet, and Sun's web presence on it, was a far more fair and efficient vehicle for the dissemination of Sun's financial information - as opposed to the expensive, and proprietary networks fostered by ratings agencies and the Wall Street Journal.
Post-Sun
On February 4, 2010, Schwartz resigned from his post as CEO of Sun. His resignation was a haikuHaiku
' , plural haiku, is a very short form of Japanese poetry typically characterised by three qualities:* The essence of haiku is "cutting"...
on Twitter that read as follows: "Financial crisis/Stalled too many customers/CEO no more."
On August 12, 2010, Schwartz was named to Taleo Corporation
Taleo Corporation
Taleo Corporation is a publicly traded provider of cloud-based Talent Management solutions headquartered in Dublin, Calif. Taleo’s solutions are primarily centered around talent acquisition , performance management, learning and development, and compensation management...
's board of directors, on September 9, 2010 he announced founding a new company, Picture of Health.
On April 7, 2011, Schwartz was named to Silver Spring Network's board of directors; on October 26, 2011 he was named to the board of Moxie Software.
Ideology and controversy
Schwartz has long held a view that the Information AgeInformation Age
The Information Age, also commonly known as the Computer Age or Digital Age, is an idea that the current age will be characterized by the ability of individuals to transfer information freely, and to have instant access to knowledge that would have been difficult or impossible to find previously...
has given way to the "Participation Age", in which individuals connected to the network are both creators and consumers of news, ideas, and content. He has been an outspoken evangelist for technology as a social utility—comparable to electricity or railroads—that creates an opportunity to drive economic, political and societal progress. He has been a consistent lobbyist in Washington, DC on behalf of regulations that protect the ability of individuals to maintain rights on par with corporations in the protection and promotion of free speech and intellectual property protection.
Articles
- Markets set free by open source - Financial Times.com September 16, 2008 - Article discusses how the internet and open source allow people to participate directly in broadening economic opportunity, speeding social progress and driving market efficiency.
- Sun's 'Open'-Door Policy - eWeek March 15, 2008 - Article discusses how the company is leveraging open source to make new enterprise inroads.
- The 'Warrior' Within Jonathan Schwartz - Article discusses Schwartz' personal history and rise, accessed January 22, 2008
- Sun CEO Emerges From McNealy's Shadow. - San Francisco Chronicle. December 15, 2006. After 7 months as Sun's top executive, Schwartz says the company is expanding its business.
- Blogger in Chief - Fortune. October 30, 2006. Jonathan Schwartz discusses his communication priorities as Sun's CEO and the importance of his blog.
- Sun Promotes Alternate View - Techworld.com. April 11, 2005. Article where Schwartz felt the GPL was being used "as a tool allowing United States businesses to pillage developing countries of their intellectual property."
- Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal - jonathanischwartz.wordpress.com. March 9, 2010. Schwartz discusses how patent and litigation work. How and why companies maintain huge patent portfolios as a defense and also to extract royalty in case of IP misuse.
External links
- What I Couldn't Say… - Schwartz blog on things he couldn't say as Sun CEO.
- Schwartz's Twitter feed