OFA Virtual Workshop 2021 Call for Sessions Expanded; Sponsorships Now Available

/ / Consortium News

The OpenFabrics Alliance (OFA) has expanded the Call for Sessions for its OFA Virtual Workshop 2021, offering further details on the original themes and adding an entirely new track to submit to.

This year’s technical program will now focus on four major themes, or tracks (detailed overviews of the themes and tracks can be found below):

  • Networks and the Convergence of HPC, Big Data and Artificial Intelligence
  • Evolving Networks in the Commercial World
  • Networking Technology Nuts and Bolts
  • Networking Ecosystem and the Community
  • Other Topics in High-Performance Networking and Computing

Networks and the Convergence of HPC, Big Data Analytics, and AI

This track is intended to address major themes and directions in advanced networks and their applications, both today and in the near future that impact the way networks are designed or deployed. Examples of topics likely to be addressed in this track include the role of networking in developing and deploying computational storage, the emerging application of network accelerators of all stripes, the emergence of Persistent Memory as an industry trend, and many others. Also included in this track could be sessions devoted to discussion of the requirements placed on networks and network APIs by current and emerging applications.

Evolving Networks in the Commercial World

High performance, low latency networks are often associated with HPC-style applications, but that overlooks the large and growing deployments of these networks in commercial applications such as cloud deployments, the financial services industry, and other segments that rely on high throughput, low latency and scalability. This directional track is designed to explore the needs for network throughput, latency, predictability, and other network characteristics valued in the commercial space.

Networking Technology Nuts and Bolts

This track is designed to allow the community to discuss the technical details of any good network – including specific wire protocols, RDMA-based networks, details of APIs currently in deployment or under development, new extensions to existing networking technologies, and much more.

Networking Ecosystem and the Community

The community of people with an interest in networks is broad and in many cases is overlapping.  A great example of this is the OFA’s new Fabric Software Development Platform, which is a program supported by the OFA and its members but is intended to benefit a much broader community including the open source community of which the OFA is a part. This track is designed as a forum to encourage open communication and the exchange of ideas among all participants in the networking ecosystem.

Other Topics in High-Performance Networking and Computing

Is there a topic you’d like to bring up at the workshop, perhaps one that doesn’t fit neatly into one of the other four tracks? Try as we might, each year a number of interesting and germane proposals are received that don’t fit squarely elsewhere. Think of this track as an open forum to discuss and debate new ideas and interesting developments that defy characterization.

As a reminder, the deadline to submit session proposals is January 22, 2021, at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time. For a list of Workshop topics, session formats and proposal submission instructions, download the official OFA Workshop 2021 Call for Sessions flyer.

To submit a speaking proposal, visit https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=ofaws2021

Sponsorship Now Available:

The OFA will again offer its members sponsorship opportunities to promote their support for the OFA Virtual Workshop 2021. These sponsorships will be available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Workshop sponsorship opportunities include:

Virtual Sponsorship Opportunities

 

Workshop Gold Sponsor

Number Available: 1

Sponsorship includes recognition by the emcee at the start of each day and logo featured on the official Workshop presentation template.

 

*includes items highlighted in Workshop Break sponsorship

 

 

$10,000

 

Workshop Break Talk Sponsor

Number Available: 5 (limited to one per day)

Sponsorship includes one ~15min speaking opportunity during the regular Workshop break to present on any topic relevant to the OpenFabrics Community. Can include promotional material specific to a company, product and/or technology.

 

 

$5,000

 

Workshop Break Sponsor

Number Available: 5

Sponsorship includes one break slide to promote company, product and/or technology. Promotional slide to appear for ~15mins each day as part of regular Workshop break slides.

 

 

$3,000

 

In addition to the above benefits, all sponsors will be mentioned in official OFA Virtual Workshop 2021 communications and have their logos featured on the OFA Workshop webpage.

To secure your sponsorship, please contact press@216.137.189.21 with the following information:

  • Contact Name, Email and Phone
  • Affiliated Company/Organization
  • Preferred Sponsorship Option

Registration Reminder:

Don’t forget to register for the 2021 OFA Virtual Workshop, which is free of charge for all attendees. Register using the links below or visit the Registration page.

Date/Time

Registration Link

Monday, March 15
8:00AM-11:00AM PT

https://bit.ly/OFAWS21_Day1

Tuesday, March 16
8:00AM-11:00AM PT

https://bit.ly/OFAWS21_Day2

Wednesday, March 17
8:00AM-11:00AM PT

https://bit.ly/OFAWS21_Day3

Thursday, March 18
8:00AM-11:00AM PT

https://bit.ly/OFAWS21_Day4

Friday, March 19
8:00AM-11:00AM PT

https://bit.ly/OFAWS21_Day5

 

Please contact press@216.137.189.21 with questions related to the Call for Sessions, Sponsorships or  Registration.