On February 19th, the SAP Speaker Series welcomed UC Berkeley Graduate Professor, David Patterson, to the stage at HanaHaus. Over 40 years ago, David helped pioneer the RISC processor design that is still used in 99% of all new computer chips today. He is also one of 70 people in the world to receive the Turing Award (also referred to as the "Nobel Peace Prize of Computing"), for his amazing accomplishments in the realm of technological innovation.

By Collin Sommerhauser from SAP Bay Area

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It’s not every day that you get an opportunity to be in the same room as a computer pioneer that revolutionized the world of technology. But how fortunate are we that Silicon Valley is home to some of the most transformative and influential figures in technological history!

The conversation began with an anecdote from David talking about what it was like to accept the 2017 Turing Award along with Stanford Professor, John Hennessy. David explained that although John was at Stanford and he was at UC Berkeley, they were very good friends as well as the leading academic professors in computer technology at their respective universities. They ended up putting the school rivalries aside to start the Berkeley RISC project in 1980, which inevitably led to their Turing Award 37 years later. David and John pioneered the concept of reduced instruction set computing and coined the term "RISC.” They also co-authored a book about computer architecture that is still widely used in computer science education today.

David then went onto explore the history of computer architecture, including Moore’s Law and how it has evolved since the 1960s. Coined by the famous Gordon E. Moore, Moore’s Law states that we can expect the speed and capability of our computers to increase every couple of years; a notion that has held true in the computer industry for over half a century. But David noted that to 50-year veterans in the computer industry, it’s shocking to see how Moore’s Law has begun to slow down after so many years of exponential growth. He explained that people magically thought microprocessors would continue to shrink and computers would continue to get faster all on their own; however, this doesn’t happen without human innovation.

Just as Moore’s Law began to slow down, a new emerging technology simultaneously began to take off. David dove into the topics of artificial intelligence and machine learning, stating that he believes these technologies have the power to alter the course of the future the way that microprocessors and the internet once did. He described this trend where essentially “the whole software stack is shifting from traditional, top-down programming to data-driven programming in an effort to accelerate speed via special purpose computer hardware.” With so many use cases for AI/ML, David thinks this is the most exciting time in history to be in the computer field.

As David wrapped up his speech, he ended with a few pieces of advice for the audience:

  • Seek out feedback and learn from it. It’s dangerous to assume that you’re the smartest person in the room, and it can lead to terrible mistakes. Always be open to learning from others as it will make you more successful in the long run.

  • It’s not how many projects you start; it’s how many you finish. Don’t overwhelm yourself and try to boil the ocean. It’s not about the quantity of the projects you take on; it’s about the quality of the projects you get done.

  • Maximize personal happiness. Wealth doesn’t directly correlate to happiness. Be sure to find the right balance between work, spending time with family, and investing in your personal well-being. You’ll thank yourself later in life.

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Interested in listening to David Patterson’s full presentation? Check out the full video replay here!