Prof. Peter Hofstee

Chief Technical Advisor
Distinguished Research Staff Member, IBM | Professor, Delft University of Technology

Prof. Peter Hofstee is a distinguished research staff member at IBM Austin and part-time professor in Big Data Systems at Delft University of Technology. He is best known as chief architect of the Synergistic Processor Elements in the Cell Broadband Engine processor, used in Sony’s PlayStation 3 and IBM’s Roadrunner supercomputer — the first system to achieve sustained petaflop operation in 2008. The A2 processor family — including the A2O core that PowerCommons aims to revive—was developed following IBM’s game console processor designs: the Xbox 360 processor and Hofstee’s Cell processor for the PlayStation 3. Prof. Hofstee’s pioneering work on the Cell architecture directly influenced the A2 family’s design philosophy. His decades of experience in high-performance heterogeneous computing and deep knowledge of the architectural lineage connecting Cell to A2O make him uniquely qualified to guide PowerCommons’ technical strategy for reviving and modernizing the A2O core for contemporary applications including AI workloads and open-source supercomputing.

Ganesan Narayanasamy

Mentor and Community Advisor
President, OpenPower Foundation | CEO - ObjectAutomation Inc.. Ganesan Narayanasamy is a technology leader with nearly three decades of experience at IBM, where he held leadership positions focused on high-performance computing, chip design, and artificial intelligence. He was instrumental in driving the OpenPOWER and AI ecosystem initiatives, with emphasis on partner enablement and market development, creating training programs for partners and supporting emerging market opportunities worldwide. As President of the OpenPOWER Foundation and CEO of Object Automation System Solutions Inc., Ganesan leads global initiatives to expand the OpenPOWER ecosystem through academic partnerships and industry collaboration. He actively collaborates with leading institutions including IIT Madras, IIT Roorkee, and IIT Ropar on Microwatt and chip design education initiatives ObjectAutomation, making him ideally positioned to guide PowerCommons’ technical direction and ecosystem development. His extensive experience in ecosystem building, partner enablement, and academic outreach provides PowerCommons with critical strategic guidance for community engagement, institutional partnerships, and long-term sustainability planning.