Drew Major

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Drew Major (born June 17, 1956^[1]) was one of the founders of Novell and the lead architect and developer of NetWare operating system for over 15 years. In 1981 Drew and his partners Kyle Powell, Dale Neibaur and Mark Hurst saw the value of enabling PCs to share files and other resources via local area networks (LAN). By 1991 NetWare was the “killer app” that was driving PC and most LAN deployments. Novell created and owned 75% of the market for network operating systems. One magazine estimated that NetWare’s $1 billion in yearly sales was driving many times that amount in network and server hardware, PCs, consulting, and other value-added sales.

Major latter lead Novell in its move to being a supplier of enterprise directory services.^[2]

Drew continues to be a passionate developer of high performance network server software. He enjoys designing and coding software that squeezes the maximum performance out of microprocessors, disk drives and networks. In 2000 Drew started Move Networks, which recently has built technology that reliably streams high-quality video over the Internet. Major left Novell in 2003 and, with Paul Sherer (ex-3Com CTO responsible for Ethernet’s success), founded Arroyo Video Solutions. Arroyo developed high-performance video servers for the cable industry and telcos. In 2006 Cisco acquired Arroyo Video Solutions and Drew became a Cisco Systems Fellow continuing his focus on internet content and services delivery.

In 1995, BYTE magazine named Drew Major one of the 20 Most prominent People for the preceding 20 years of the computer industry. He was inaugurated into the National Computer Industry Hall of Fame in 1999.

Major received his Bachelor of Science degree from Brigham Young University in 1980, graduating with high honors in mathematics and computer science. He was born in California but has lived most of his life in Utah. He currently resides in Orem, Utah with his wife, Mary, and their four sons.

Major is a Latter-day Saint.^[3]