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Deep Blue veteran plots Lotus game-plan

Andrew Donoghue ZDNet.co.uk

Published: 03 Aug 2004 12:35 BST

I understand that you were involved in the Deep Blue project?
Yes, those were the days.

What was your part in Deep Blue?
I was the manager of the project. My key role in that is that I killed the project. The point was that they were doing research for eight years and my view was that either they make the big play or they don't play at all. They asked me what was the big play and I said you have to beat the reigning champion.

So going up against Garry Kasparov was your idea?
I didn't do anything with the technology, I just pushed them and said there is no point in spending money unless we can really show that we can play the big game.

Did you manage to do see the film about the match -- Game Over -- which came out last year?
I have read some books on it but haven't seen the movie

What's your take on the various conspiracy theories around the game -- that Deep Blue was being manipulated by a human for instance? And that the machine was dismantled straight away without giving Kasparov the opportunity of a rematch?
The whole idea for doing this is to see if the technology can reach a point where we can pass a threshold that has been a 100-year-old computing problem. When the threshold was reached, there was no reason for me as the head of computer science to continue to invest. From an IBM research perspective, we did our job, many of the technologies developed from that time ended up in our supercomputer systems.

The director of the film -- Vikram Jayanti -- made some comments that IBM was under a lot of pressure to win that contest and would have gone to any lengths to ensure victory. Was there a lot of pressure from the rest of the company to win?
No, the pressure was from me on my team because we were trying to solve a scientific quest. It was an important problem -- similar to the first time a machine went faster than a human being; so could a machine beat a reigning chess champion was a big question.

In 1993 when Lou Gerstner came along we weren't doing particularly well, and there was a general feeling that IBM was a dinosaur. In that environment anything that came out from IBM that showed we were investing in innovation said 'IBM isn't a stodgy company and can actually deliver world-class technology'.

What is it about the culture at IBM that has kept you there for so many years?
I have found IBM to be largest sand-box that I have ever come across. They are prepared to invest in industry-transforming technology.

It's interesting that IBM have put someone of your technical pedigree in charge of Lotus rather than someone with less technical expertise but more focus on marketing and winning the numbers game with Microsoft.
Al Zollar had done a fine job in transforming Lotus and getting to point where I could step in. I think the company had got to a point where it needed someone with the technical vision to move it on to the next stage. A transition comes in the industry and you need different skills -- although I am not that bad at marketing.