The Open Compute Project Foundation (OCP), the international non-profit organization bringing hyperscale innovations to all, announced new additions to its Advisory Board. Joining the current OCP Advisory Board, made up of representatives from Ampere, Samsung, Seagate and Supermicro, will be thought leaders from Dell Technologies, Delta, Lambda, Oracle, Schneider Electric and Vantage Data Centers.
“As the OCP Foundation’s strategic intent for data center infrastructure solutions evolves, covering silicon to systems to facilities to the grid, and consequently our Community continues to grow, we are expanding the Foundation’s Advisory Board specifically with representatives from organizations that reach new businesses, new technology segments, and geographies relevant to the OCP Community”, states George Tchaparian, OCP Chief Executive Officer.
The OCP Advisory Board is appointed by the OCP Foundation Board of Directors and the Foundation CEO to provide specialist and strategic advice to help solve a range of business and growth challenges for the Open Compute Project Foundation. The AB members will be asked to provide advice on how to grow the Foundation, manage significant business and technology transitions, and expand into new innovative technologies, market segments and geographies.
AB member companies are selected on their contribution to the OCP Community using, but not limited to, the following criteria:
- Volunteer positions held by members of their Company
- Committed sponsorships for OCP events and directed funds
- Approved contributions with authors from their organizations
- Market place listings (for vendor member companies)
- Accepted OCP Event Presentations
- Demonstrated technology domain expertise and leadership
The representatives from each of the three new organizations are:
Dell Technologies – Ty Schmitt, Fellow – Ty Schmitt is a Fellow in Dell’s Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) CTO organization. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Texas A&M and has 34 years of experience in manufacturing, IT hardware design, engineering and research management, advanced data center thermal simulation and cooling solutions, sustainability, and modular data center design and manufacturing. Ty currently leads power, cooling, sustainability and data center infrastructure technology strategy. He has worked at Dell for 32 years and has 69 patents.
Delta Electronics – Ralf Pieper, R&D Director – Ralf Pieper is the R&D Director for Server, Networking and Telecom applications and has worked for Delta Energy Systems (Germany) since 1998. He studied electrical engineering at the University of Paderborn, Germany and after he graduated with his masters degree, he continued to work for 2 years at the University. At Delta he started as an electrical design engineer for switched mode power supplies until he took over the R&D management task in 2008.
Lambda – Alee Fong, Global DC Infrastructure – Alee Fong is a DC Infrastructure leader at Lambda, with over 14 years of experience in data center infrastructure design, procurement, and deployment. He brings comprehensive expertise spanning rack design and integration, power distribution, and thermal management for high-density compute environments. At Lambda, Alee is focused on designing and building the company’s data center environments for GPU cloud infrastructure. His work focuses on high-density power and cooling capable of supporting intensive AI workloads, from initial design through construction coordination. His deep technical knowledge of rack-level infrastructure and component integration proved essential in designing systems that maximize compute density while maintaining operational reliability. Mr. Fong is a graduate of the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure – Jim Britton, Architect, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) – Jim Britton is an Architect in the CTO organization at OCI with 25+ years of experience in operating systems and data center architecture. Previously, a Distinguished Engineer at VMware/Broadcom, he led hardware enablement for the ESXi Core Hypervisor and spent 15 years aligning vSphere/ESXi with emerging CPU and server technologies. Through his deep partnerships across the ecosystem, he has driven alignment on industry standards for hardware/software interfaces. He began his career at Cobalt (acquired by Sun Microsystems) as an early adopter of open-source software and standards that drove innovation. Jim is committed to open, interoperable infrastructure, and collaborative industry progress in support of OCP’s mission.
Schneider Electric – Fabricio Alves Borges, League Leader of Rack DC Systems – Fabricio Alves Borges is AI Product Strategy Leader for White Space and League Leader at Schneider Electric’s Secure Power division. He leads the product portfolio of Schneider Electric’s Rack DC power systems including OCP-inspired architectures designed to meet the demanding requirements of AI workloads and hyperscale data centers. In this role, Fabricio also focuses on the booming AI market, the opportunities and challenges of deploying high-density AI/GPU servers from industry leaders and help to define the roadmap strategy of the data center server rack and power distribution solutions to address them. Before joining Schneider Electric, he served as a professor of electrical engineering, sharing his expertise in advanced power conversion technologies. Fabricio holds a Master’s in Electrical Engineering with a focus on Power Electronics and an MBA, complemented by executive education at INSEAD.
Vantage Data Centers – Robin Balen, Chief Product Officer – Balen leads the company’s global product vision and roadmap, working to drive innovation and deliver world-class data center solutions for customers. He has extensive global experience developing hyperscale infrastructure and leading long-term technology strategies supporting major cloud and AI providers. Balen’s technical depth across electrical, mechanical and compute systems, combined with his ability to guide complex innovation programs, position him uniquely to scale Vantage’s global product portfolio. In 2000, Balen founded Gyron, a pioneering UK data center business that grew into a market leader before its acquisition by NTT. Balen spent nearly two decades leading and scaling the platform, including seven years in senior leadership roles following the acquisition. Most recently, as principal at Asymptote Solutions, Balen advised investors and operators on next-generation infrastructure architectures, product design strategies and large-scale delivery models for hyperscalers.
With a more global representation on its Advisory Board, the Foundation begins the year on a strong growth trajectory. OCP had a strong finish to 2025 with more than 500 member companies, and a 150+ project workstreams. OCP organizes events spanning North America, EMEA and APAC. You can view all the upcoming events here: https://www.opencompute.org/events/upcoming-events.