30 Notable IT Executive Moves: November 2012

Notable In November

Following a hectic October of notable IT executive moves, November also had plenty of surprises in store for some of IT's best-known companies. Here's a look at major moves, starting with big transitions at Intel and Microsoft.

Paul Otellini

In a surprise move, Intel confirmed in mid-November that President and CEO Paul Otellini will be retiring in May 2013. Intel Chairman and former CFO Andy Bryant told reporters that Otellini is leaving Intel a lot sooner than expected, and that Intel had done everything to try to get Otellini -- who it was assumed would be retiring in a few years -- to stay longer. Intel partners told CRN following the announcement that whoever succeeds Otellini must continue to double down on the chip giant's mobile strategy, or risk big challenges going forward.

Steven Sinofsky

In another surprise announcement from the kingdom of Wintel, Microsoft's Steven Sinofsky, the contentious head of its all-important Windows division, suddenly departed the company in mid-November. While speculation held that Sinofsky had constant friction with other Microsoft executives and erred on certain aspects of the Windows 8 strategy, partners were mixed on whether his ouster would be a positive. Meanwhile, Julie Larson-Greene and Tami Reller have succeeded Sinofsky's role as president of Windows and Windows Live, as, respectively, corporate vice president for Windows experience and CFO and chief marketing officer for Windows.

Julie Parrish

Onward and upward for channel stalwart Julie Parrish, who in mid-November was promoted to chief marketing officer of NetApp. Parrish was most recently NetApp's vice president, global partner sales, and has been NetApp's channel chief since joining the company in 2008. NetApp is now looking for a new channel chief and talking with both internal and external candidates, Parrish told CRN.

Joe Sexton

Mid-November brought a few big changes in the upper executive echelon at McAfee. Joe Sexton, former head of global sales, left the company to "pursue other opportunities" and was replaced by Steve Redman, previously regional president for Asia Pacific and now McAfee's executive vice president, global sales.

In addition, McAfee hired Penny Baldwin as executive vice president and chief marketing officer. Baldwin had previously been acting CMO and senior vice president, global brand strategy at Yahoo.

David DeWalt

Since leaving McAfee, David DeWalt's been a rumored CEO candidate at a handful of security and infrastructure companies. Finally, in late November, he was confirmed as the new chief executive at FireEye, where he was already chairman of the board. FireEye's specialties include signature-based firewalls, IPS, anti-virus and gateways. Founder and previous CEO Ashar Aziz will now be vice chairman, CTO and chief strategy officer.

Dell Enterprise

All eyes are on Dell's enterprise strategy, which is becoming a bastion of growth for Round Rock even as its consumer division lags. In mid-November, it made several additional moves, including the acquisition of infrastructure automation software specialist Gale Technologies, and the unveiling of a new Enterprise Systems & Solutions organization, focused on converged enterprise infrastructure solutions. Dario Zamarian (pictured), who had been vice president and general manager of Dell Networking, is taking over that organization, while meanwhile, Dell hired Tom Burns as its new Networking boss. Burns joined Dell from Alcatel-Lucent, where he was president, Enterprise and Strategic Industries Business Group. Both Zamarian and Burns report to Marius Haas, president, Dell Enterprise Solutions.

Chris Kubasik

It should have been a smooth transition Christopher Kubasik, who up until early November was set to become CEO of Lockheed Martin in the new year. But Kubasik, vice chairman, president and COO, resigned following the disclosure that he had a "close, personal relationship with a subordinate employee." Certainly not the first tech executive to be undone by a similar scandal, Kubasik's job instead goes to Marilyn Hewson, who was most recently executive vice president, Electronic Systems, and will succeed current Lockheed Chairman and CEO Robert Stevens in January.

Martin Fink

It just wouldn't be a monthly executive moves roundup without some changes at HP, and there were several in early November. Martin Fink, who recently headed HP's Business Critical Server business, was named CTO and head of HP Labs, replacing departed exec Prith Banerjee ...

Eric Keshin

... while Eric Keshin, senior vice president of marketing and strategy in HP's Printing and Personal Systems division, left the company ...

Alan Kessler

... and Alan Kessler, formerly vice president of worldwide sales and service for HP enterprise security products, became CEO of encryption vendor Vormetric. Kessler, who had left HP back in September, was known to partners as president and general manager of TippingPoint, acquired with 3Com back in 2009.

Sharon McCollam

CEO Hubert Joly is busy building a team to turnaround struggling electronics retail giant Best Buy, and in mid-November came a big hire: Sharon McCollam, a retired director and former EVP, COO and CFO of Williams-Sonoma. McCollam will be Best Buy's chief administrative officer and CFO effective December 10, succeeding James Muelhbauer as CFO.

Paul Bay

A changing of the guard in one of Ingram Micro's most important positions: Paul Bay was named acting president of Ingram North America and will remove the "acting" part in January, succeeding ...

Keith Bradley

... Keith Bradley, whom Ingram confirmed in mid-November is leaving the distributor giant to pursue other opportunities.

"We thank Keith for his significant contributions to Ingram Micro's North American operations," said Alain Monie, CEO of Ingram Micro, in a statement. "Keith leaves a legacy that will benefit our organization for years to come, and we wish him well in his future endeavors."

Chris Dixon

Venture capital big wheel Andreessen Horowitz isn't known for adding just any old partner to its ranks, so it was big news in mid-November when Chris Dixon, the New York-based angel investor and entrepreneur, confirmed he would leave eBay and join Andreessen Horowitz in exactly that capacity: full-time general partner. Dixon had been working at eBay since it bought one of his previous companies, Hunch, in 2011. He will relocate to Menlo Park, Calif., from New York in the new year.

CA Shakeup

CA Technologies' restructuring of its data management business led to the exits of two well-known executives: Dave Roberts (pictured) and Tracy Balent. Roberts, a popular channel chief, was vice president of Americas sales for data management since joining CA in 2010. He's launching his own company, Clear Fork Group, which designs sales organizations and offers consulting for pre-IPO businesses. Balent, who'd been with CA since 1996, had a number of channel roles, including vice president of Americas channel marketing, data management.

Henry Wasik

Cloud infrastructure specialist Joyent has a new CEO: Henry Wasik, most recently president and CEO of Force10 Networks. Wasik, who'd been at Force10 since 2004, grew revenue at that company tenfold, and before Force10, he was senior vice president at Alcatel. Force10 was sold to Dell in 2011. At Joyent, Wasik replaces Jason Hoffman, co-founder and CTO, who'd been acting CEO since the departure earlier this year of David Young.

Richard Williamson

There's been more than a little discord at Apple lately, and much of it stems from the fallout from its Apple Maps debacle. In late November, Apple fired Richard Williamson, senior director of iOS platform services, who spearheaded development of its new mapping service. A New York Times report suggested that Eddy Cue, senior vice president for Internet software and services and an increasingly more visible executive at Apple, was the one who ousted Williamson.

OJ Winge/Rowan Trollope

Cisco's collaboration business unit is struggling, so a change in its top job -- which happened in early November -- was no big surprise. O.J. Winge, most recently senior vice president and general manager, Cisco Collaboration Technology Group, is leaving the company and has been replaced by Rowan Trollope, most recently group president of Symantec SMB and Symantec cloud business.

Jeff Von Deylen

When CenturyLink acquired Savvis in 2011, it gave the telecom giant a major cloud infrastructure and hosted IT presence. Now, Savvis also has a new leader: Jeff Von Deylen, named president of Savvis on Nov. 28. Von Deylen had been at Savvis since 2003 as CFO and a board member, and earlier in his career he had positions at American Electric Power Co., GTS Telecom, Qwest and Arthur Andersen. Bill Fathers, whom Von Deylen is succeeding, will leave the company in March 2013.

Andy Lees

Andy Lees, who was demoted as a Microsoft president a year ago, has kept a lower profile in 2012. But in November, Lees was confirmed as Microsoft's new head of corporate development and strategy -- a quiet move by Microsoft in the midst of much louder executive changes there this month.

Miles Valentine

Enghouse Systems paid $30.6 million to acquire Zeacom -- a significant acquisition in the contact center space and a booster for Enghouse in that it gets Zeacom's cloud, hosted and on-premise contact center platforms for SMBs. Zeacom also confirmed, however, that CEO Miles Valentine, who founded Zeacom in 1994, won't be sticking around. Valentine plans to exit effective Dec. 15 to pursue other interests, the company said.

Craig Thompson

Executive changes have not been infrequent at Alcatel-Lucent as the French telecom giant looks to lift itself out of the financial doldrums. In early November, Alcatel-Lucent appointed Craig Thompson, a veteran of Nokia, to be the SVP of a new business unit managing the company's intellectual property assets, including Alcatel's more than 29,000 patents. Thompson has deep expertise in intellectual property licensing and has also been a practicing lawyer for nearly two decades.

Barry Davis

A year of big changes for Blue Coat Systems, in addition to a CEO firing and the acquisition of the company by private equity, has also affected its channel program. Along with several tweaks to Blue Coat's partner benefits, it has a new Americas channel chief, Barry Davis, now vice president, Americas channel sales. Davis, a veteran of HP, ArcSight, Citrix and other companies, was on hand for Blue Coat's partner conference in Las Vegas in mid-November.

Andrew Crouch

Andrew Crouch, most recently regional president of North America Sales for Level 3 Communications, got a bump up to president of North America, giving him full responsibility for the region's operations, marketing and sales. Crouch has been a Level 3 stalwart for more than a decade, and earlier in his career he worked at British Telecom and the BT-AT&T joint venture Concert.

Bob Gault

Cisco is plowing resources into its partner programs specific to cloud computing, and in November, it merged what were formerly CSP- and MSP-focused programs into a new offering, the Cisco Cloud and Managed Services Program (CMSP). Part of Cisco's stepped-up emphasis on cloud has meant staffing the channel aspect of it with experienced executives, and earlier in November, Cisco moved Bob Gault. most recently vice president of worldwide services provider channels, to a new role as vice president, global cloud and managed services, overseeing the CSP/MSP strategy for Cisco's Worldwide Partner Organization (WWPO).

Jim Dixon

Solution Provider 500 power CompuCom has a planned succession in the works for CEO Jim Dixon, it confirmed in late November. Tony Doye, most recently CEO of Fujitsu Americas from April 2010 to November 2012, joined CompuCom as divisional CEO, assuming responsibilities for all sales and support functions at the solution provider. The expectation is that Doye will succeed Dixon as CEO and that Dixon will remain CompuCom chairman, although that transition is not expected to happen for a few years.

Carmen Aviles

LAN Infotech in early November confirmed Carmen Aviles as its new vice president of business development. Aviles has more than 25 years of IT experience and was previously president of Eco-Tech, which specializes in cloud and IT services for customers in South Florida.

Dave Frederickson

Dave Frederickson, a staple of the HP Canada community having served in it for 24 years, joined Calgary-based solution provider bigwig Long View Systems as vice president of business development. Frederickson was most recently vice president and general manager of HP's ESSN unit for Canada, and among his first duties at Long View will be to launch the solution provider's Toronto office early in the new year.

Jeanette Wing

In Jeanette Wing, Microsoft picked up a heavy hitter from academe to be its new vice president and head of Microsoft Research International. Wing, a leading figure in computer science research, was most recently at Carnegie Mellon University and the National Science Foundation.

Michael Gough

Gough, a channel veteran with about 20 years of experience, landed at Cbeyond to run its Eastern U.S. region. He was previously a channel chief at Cavalier Telephone before its acquisition by Paetec in 2010, and then was vice president for Paetec's national partner program before its acquisition by Windstream in 2011. He was most recently vice president of channel sales for 10n2 Technologies.