Leading a global open source project with hundreds of contributors across borders, cultures, platforms, and organizations is a prospect fraught with challenges.
Deven Panchal is well aware of those challenges, having led two such projects for AT&T Labs:
Acumos, the world’s first open source AI marketplace
ONAP, which allowed developers to embed AI into the design and deployment of network, telecom, and security services
To manage—if not avoid—the myriad complications entailed by such endeavors depends, Panchal says, on multiple factors, from a shared vision to radical transparency to interaction-tracking mechanisms.
It also requires trust, both that people will do the right thing and that inevitable conflicts will be respectfully resolved.
All of these factors require skilled leaders at the helm; the best, he says, have “worn many hats.” Panchal’s varied industry experiences, leadership skills, and innovative work certainly qualify him on all fronts. They also earned him a spot among Computing’s Top 30 Early Career Professionals for 2024.
In the following Q&A, Panchal describes
Details of the ground-breaking ONAP project, including its impact on people and networks across the world
The pioneering concepts he developed for use in the global Acumos AI marketplace, including Reusable MLOps to allow organizations to use standardized AI model pipelines
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