eBay flies to Sun for data center head

The Oracle skedaddle

After losing its senior director of data center services and strategy to Steve Jobs and Apple, eBay has grabbed a replacement from Sun.

Today, the outline auction house announced the hiring of Sun veteran Dean Nelson as its senior director of global data center strategy, architecture, and operations. The title has changed a bit, but it would seem that Nelson is stepping in for Olivier Sanche, who departed for Apple in mid-August.

Nelson also announced the move from his blog at Data Center Pulse, a global group of data center owners, operators, and users that aims to monitor the "pulse and influence" of the data center industry and share what is so often called "best practices."

"I am very excited to help eBay achieve its vision of the future," Nelson wrote. "I am absolutely on-board and ready to rumble. I'm also excited about what this means for Data Center Pulse. We're killing two birds with one stone here. The work that I am responsible for in eBay is perfectly aligned with the industry efforts we are pushing for in DCP. We will be accelerating our efforts and uniting end-users to drive innovation and direct the future of the datacenter market. Boo-yah!"

Nelson joined Sun in 1989, on his 21st birthday. In the beginning, he did component-level debugging for deskside servers in the company's Milpitas manufacturing plant and eventually worked his way up to senior director of global lab & data center design services.

eBay says Nelson will lead the completion of its new data center in Utah, insisting the facility "will serve as a showcase for the latest innovations in electrical, mechanical and cooling technologies."

It would appear that Nelson is leaving Sun at least partly because of its pending acquisition by Oracle. "When the official announcement came through that Oracle intended to purchase Sun, it caused many people to rethink their future," he wrote. "I have always believed that if I am challenged in my job, being stretched to continuously learn, have a solid team, executive support, and of course good compensation, there isn't a reason to look for something else. But with uncertainty, I also believed it was prudent to see what options were out there." ®