Technology >> CEO Interviews >> June 17, 2002
HUBERT (BERT) WHYTE has more than 30 years' experience in the
telecommunications industry. After stints with British Telecom, Siemens,
Mitel Communications and others, Mr. Whyte's career progressed rapidly
when he moved to a start-up company, Newbridge Networks, as VP of
Marketing for Europe. Under his international expertise, sales reached
nearly $150 million for the fledgling company within a four-year period.
As the company continued to expand, Mr. Whyte took charge of the new
Access Business Unit, driving the business at an intensive pace, and
achieved $200 million in sales in three years. In 1995 Mr. Whyte moved
to ACC, the company that installed the first Internet node. He focused
his experience, knowledge, driving management style and pure instinct to
lead this traditional engineering company through a complete overhaul,
achieving the acquisition of ACC by Ericsson in 1998 for $400 million
dollars. In 1999, Mr. Whyte accepted yet another turnaround opportunity,
becoming President and CEO of net.com (Network Equipment Technologies,
Inc.), formerly a pioneer and leader in wide area networking. Mr.
Whyte's challenge is to recreate and surpass the company's former status
and he is intent on taking the company to a leadership position in the
new field of service creation for service providers. Mr. Whyte has a
firm grasp on today's challenges and a clear view of how communications
will transition to more automated, user-driven networks based on IP
(Internet protocol). Service providers will require open service
creation platforms that enable them to rapidly respond to user demands.
Mr. Whyte sees IP as ubiquitous as electricity in a world where
bandwidth has been completely commoditized and only a lack of vision,
creativity and excitement stand between a service provider and success. Profile
Network?
Mr. Whyte: We have been around nearly 20 years. We were very well-known
in the networking industry in the late
