Mark Hornick is a Director in the Oracle Database Advanced Analytics group focusing on Oracle R Enterprise (ORE), Oracle R Connector for Hadoop (ORCH), and Oracle R Distribution (ORD). He also works with internal and external customers in the application of R for scalable applications in Oracle Database, Exadata, and the Big Data Appliance, also engaging in SAS-to-R conversion and performance benchmarking. Mark is co-author of Java Data Mining: Strategy, Standard, and Practice. He joined Oracle’s Data Mining Technologies group in 1999 through the acquisition of Thinking Machines Corp. Mark was a founding member of and currently serves as an Oracle Advisor to the IOUG Business Intelligence Warehousing and Analytics (BIWA) SIG. He has conducted training sessions on R, ORE, and ORCH in the US, EMEA, APAC, and has presented at conference, including Oracle OpenWorld, Collaborate, BIWA Summit, and the R user conference useR! Mark holds a bachelor’s degree from Rutgers University and a master’s degree from Brown University, both in computer science.

Tom Plunkett is a Senior Sales Consultant with Oracle. Tom also teaches graduate-level computer science courses for Virginia Tech as an adjunct instructor and distance learning instructor. Tom helped win several industry awards for a big data project that Oracle and the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research collaborated on to analyze relationships between genomes and cancer subtypes, including the 2012 Government Big Data Solution Award, ACT-IAC finalist for best pilot/start-up project, and was nominated for a 2013 Computer World Honor Award for Innovation. Tom has spoken internationally at over 40 conferences on the subject of Big Data since leading a team that won a Big Data project from the Office of the Secretary of Defense in 2009. Tom is the lead author of several books, including Oracle Big Data Handbook and Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud Handbook. Previously, Tom worked for IBM and practiced patent law for Fliesler Meyer. Tom has a BA and a JD from George Mason University, and an MS in computer science from Virginia Tech.