30 Notable IT Executive Moves: April 2017

Start It Off

April was a busy month for executive moves in the IT space, especially regarding channel leadership.

Dell EMC North America saw the departure of its president and filled the role with a Dell veteran. Xerox, Zayo and SentinelOne were among the companies to bring senior channel executives aboard. Intel promoted three executives to serve as group presidents, while Micron, Globetouch and Couchbase all hired new CEOs.

In the following slides, check out our picks for April's 30 most significant executive moves in the IT industry.

Bill Rodrigues

The president of Dell EMC North America, Bill Rodrigues, has departed after 18 years at Dell. Taking over the role as of May 8 is David Schmook, president of Dell's end-user computing business.

Rodrigues, who is credited with serving as an advocate for the channel during a crucial period for Dell, was initially hired by the company as a vice president and general manager to head the company's K-12 education business. Before that, he had spent 21 years at IBM, including serving as general manager for global education in North America.

Schmook has spent a total of 14 years with Dell. He spent nine years at Dell, from 1997 to 2006, before departing to become chief information officer and senior vice president of Lenovo Singapore. Schmook ultimately became president of Lenovo North America, before returning to Dell in November 2012.

Dean Douglas, et. al.

CenturyLink has announced the makeup of its senior leadership team following the closing of the acquisition of Level 3. The team consists of CenturyLink veterans as well as two Level 3 executives. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of the third quarter of 2017.

CenturyLink's Dean Douglas will serve as executive vice president, North America enterprise. He'll be responsible for functions including sales and enterprise service delivery. Level 3's Laurinda Pang will have the same responsibilities for the company's global accounts.

CenturyLink executives will head up the company's IT strategy. Aamir Hussain will serve as CTO and executive vice president, network operations. Girish Varma has been named executive vice president of IT and managed services. CenturyLink veteran Clay Bailey will stay on as vice president of transformation, leading the integration of CenturyLink and Level 3. CenturyLink's Maxine Moreau will continue to head up consumer operations as executive vice president, consumer. Level 3's Sunit Patel will serve as executive VP and chief financial officer for the combined company, in charge of domestic and international finance, along with accounting functions.

Alan Marc Smith, et. al.

The CEO of DLT Solutions, Alan Marc Smith, has departed after two years in the position. Chairman Rick Marcotte will return as CEO on an interim basis, and DLT's board will actively search for a new chief executive, the Herndon, Va.-based solution provider told CRN.

Smith had joined DLT Solutions in January 2015, when the company was acquired by private equity firm Millstein & Co., where he had been an operating partner. Previously, Smith had served as CEO of Westcon and then as chief executive of Electrograph Systems.

Meanwhile, DLT also announced in April that Joe Donohue had been appointed as its new chief financial officer, replacing longtime CFO Craig Adler. Donohue had previously spent eight years as CFO of Agilex Technologies.

Riccardo Di Blasio

IoT connectivity solutions company Globetouch has appointed Riccardo Di Blasio, formerly an executive with VMware, as its CEO.

Di Blasio comes to Globetouch from storage startup Cohesity, where he had served as the chief operating officer. Prior to that company, he had led worldwide sales for alliances at EMC and helped build the company's cloud service provider program. At VMware, Di Blasio led global sales and marketing organizations for vCloud, commercializing the platform through an ecosystem of service providers and end users.

He takes over as CEO for Ori Sasson, who will remain involved with the company as vice chairman.

Mitch Breen, et. al.

Nashua, N.H.-based networking startup Plexxi has hired the former global sales leader at SimpliVity, Mitch Breen, as its new senior vice president of enterprise sales.

Breen spent the first 26 years of his career in various executive roles at EMC. He went on to become senior vice president of North American sales for Oracle, then joined SimpliVity starting in early 2014. Breen had most recently served as chief revenue officer at Progress, a position he held for less than a year.

Meanwhile, Plexxi has also hired Mark Wright as its new vice president of sales operations. Before Plexxi, he was the COO of 3D Systems. Wright also has more than 30 years of experience working for EMC and Verizon.

Pete Peterson

Xerox has hired Pete Peterson, a longtime Tech Data executive, as senior vice president of global channel strategy. The position is a new role focused on driving best channel practices globally and growing business with multi-brand resellers.

Peterson will report to Xerox chief commercial officer Kevin Warren, and oversee infrastructure, operations, and channel program employees with global responsibilities.

Peterson previously spent 19 years Tech Data, including more than a decade in senior sales and marketing roles, before leaving the company in late 2015. He briefly held sales executive roles at Brocade and Tessco Technologies before joining Xerox.

Dee Dee Acquista

SentinelOne hired Dee Dee Acquista, formerly the channel chief at Proofpoint, as its new vice president of worldwide channels.

Acquista had served as vice president of global channels at Proofpoint, where she helped to expand the company's channel after joining in 2013 to build out partner strategy. She left Proofpoint as the company consolidated its North American channel teams.

Before Proofpoint, Acquista held channel roles at Websense and McAfee.

Fazal Merchant, et. al.

Tanium has hired a former DreamWorks Animation executive, Fazal Merchant, to serve as both its chief operating officer and chief financial officer. Merchant had previously been the CFO at DreamWorks, where he helped lead the company's $3.8 billion sale to Comcast, which was completed in August.

Merchant has also held financial and investing roles at DirecTV Latin America, RBS Global Banking & Markets and Barclays Capital.

Also, Tanium has named Cisco veteran John Maxwell to be its regional director, leading its business around state and local government, health care and education. Maxwell had spent more than two decades at Cisco, most recently serving as operations sales director for U.S. commercial security.

David Castignola

Optiv Security has appointed an executive to lead its worldwide sales strategy, David Castignola, formerly a top sales executive at RSA.

Castignola had spent 20 years at RSA, starting out as a district manager in 1997, and ultimately serving as senior vice president of worldwide sales. At Optiv, he'll hold the role of executive vice president of worldwide sales, a new position. The role will involve helping the company to develop its market strategy, as well as prepare the company for global expansion.

RSA said Ted Kamionek, vice president of business operations, will fill the global sales role for the company on an interim basis.

Glenn Chisholm

Cylance CTO Glenn Chisholm has left the company, where he had worked since 2012. Cylance did not comment on whether there was a replacement for the CTO role.

Chisholm was one of the earliest employees at Cylance, joining the company shortly after it was founded to direct its strategic product efforts. He had also led the company's research and development teams.

Chisholm had joined Cylance from Telstra, where he was chief information security officer and director of security operations. Before that, he held positions at Cisco.

Jessica Couto

After departing as channel chief at Carbonite, Jessica Couto has joined up with security automation startup Hexadite to head the company's channel initiative.

Couto had been vice president of U.S. channel sales and marketing at Carbonite, and before that, she built partner programs and worked with channel companies while at Bit9 (now Carbon Black) and Kaspersky Lab. Couto will serve as vice president of channel at Hexadite, which has just launched its first partner program.

Scott Forbush, et. al.

Zayo Group Holdings has named a new channel chief, Scott Forbush, formerly the vice president of indirect sales for Electric Lightwave. Zayo's acquisition of Electric Lightwave closed on March 1. The move will help lead to the merging of Electric Lightwave channel program and Zayo's channel community.

Forbush had been with Electric Lightwave since early 2015, and before that served in executive roles at Integra and Telesphere.

Meanwhile, Zayo also announced a new president and chief operating officer, Andrew Crouch, formerly of Level 3 Communications. Crouch is taking over for Zayo president and COO Chris Morley.

Jo McCausland, et. al.

Advanced Technology Services Group has hired a vice president of channel partner sales and solutions for the Galileo Performance Explorer infrastructure performance solution.

In the role, Jo McCausland will head up the continuing strategic direction, development and support for channel partner sales and solutions programs for Galileo. McCausland was previously in charge of national channel partner relationships for Virtual Instruments, and before that spent time at companies including VCE, FalconStor and Crossroads Systems.

Also, ATS Group has hired Kelly Nuckolls as vice president of marketing for Galileo Performance Explorer. Nuckolls previously held roles at resellers Technologent and VSS.

Phillip Gallagher

Avnet has hired Phillip Gallagher, a longtime executive at the company, as global president of Avnet's Core Distribution Business. Along with the core distribution business, Gallagher will also oversee supplier relationships, global procurement, and Avnet's supply chain solutions business.

Gallagher rejoins Avnet, which he had left in 2014, from TTI, where he was president of Americas sales and marketing.

Gallagher had started at Avnet in 1983 and went on to hold executive leadership positions in sales, marketing and operations--including serving as president of the company's Americas electronics component business between 2004 and 2009.

Diane Bryant, et. al.

Intel announced that it had promoted three executives to serve as group presidents.

Intel has named Diane Bryant as group president of the Data Center Group. Bryant has been an executive with the group since 2012, including heading up its P&L, strategy and product development. She has worked for Intel since 1985.

The company has appointed Murthy Renduchintala as group president for the Client and Internet of Things Business & Systems Architecture Group. Renduchintala has also been named chief engineering officer at Intel. He has been with the company since 2015.

Intel has named Stacy Smith group president for Manufacturing, Operations and Sales. He has worked for Intel since 1988, and held roles including chief financial officer and head of the firm's Technology and Manufacturing Group.

Sanjay Mehrotra

Micron Technology has named Sanjay Mehrotra, a co-founder and former CEO of SanDisk, as its president and CEO, effective May 8. Mehrotra will also join Micron's board of directors.

Mehrotra takes over for Mark Durcan, who is stepping down from Micron, but will serve as an advisor to the firm through early August.

Mehrotra co-founded SanDisk in 1988 and served as its president and CEO from 2011 to 2016. SanDisk was acquired for $16 billion by Western Digital Corporation in 2016.

Paul Flanagan

Nasuni has named Paul Flanagan, a managing director at Sigma Prime Ventures, as its new president. Before joining Sigma Prime as a managing director in 2009, Flanagan held executive roles including chief financial officer of VistaPrint and CEO of StorageNetworks.

Flanagan had been serving as a board member at Nasuni. "While Paul has an enviable track record as an investor, his track record running companies in the hyper-growth phase that Nasuni is now entering is equally impressive," Nasuni CEO Andres Rodriguez said in a news release.

Eric Shander

Red Hat announced it had appointed Eric Shander, the company's acting chief financial officer, as executive vice president and CFO.

Shander joined Red Hat in 2015. Previously, he had held executive roles at IBM including as vice president of Americas IT infrastructure delivery and as head of the company's Finance and Accounting Global Process Services division. He has spent time at Lenovo as vice president and chief accountant.

Jody Grandpre

Carousel Industries has appointed a vice president of sales for its Western Region, Jody Grandpre.

Grandpre will lead Carousel's efforts around sales strategy, partnerships and revenue growth in the Western U.S., and will report to Carousel chief revenue officer James Marsh.

Grandpre previously founded IT services firm Imagine Technologies.

Steve Singh, et. al.

SAP said that Steve Singh, president of business networks and applications, has departed the company, leading to several changes within its executive ranks. On May 2, Singh was named as the new CEO of Docker, replacing one of Docker's founders, Ben Golub .

Following Singh's departure from SAP, the company said Robert Enslin, head of global customer operations, will serve as president of the new Cloud Business Group. Leukert, head of products and innovation at SAP, will now have expanded duties involving SAP's platform and digital transformation strategy.

SAP has also named Adaire Fox-Martin (president of Asia Pacific Japan at the company) and Jennifer Morgan (president of North America at SAP) to the executive board and to serve as co-presidents for global customer operations.

Ravi Chopra

SonicWall said it had appointed a veteran of Juniper Networks, Ravi Chopra, as its chief financial officer.

The position of CFO has been created following the spinout of SonicWall from Dell, which was completed in November.

Chopra had worked at Juniper for 13 years in a number of roles, most recently as corporate vice president of business finance. Before Juniper, he spent four years in finance at Cisco Systems.

Kelly McClure, et. al.

10th Magnitude, a Chicago-based Microsoft Azure services firm, announced two executive additions in April.

Kelly McClure has joined the firm as the vice president of marketing. She has previously spent 15 years in marketing including at DataStax, BMC Software and Micro Focus.

Mike Denton has joined 10th Magnitude as the vice president of talent. He previously held roles in human resources and talent at Geneca, EZLinks Golf and Lextech Global Services.

Gary Hayslip

Webroot has appointed a chief information security officer to guide the company's information security program, as well as contribute to product strategy.

The new CISO, Gary Hayslip, previously served as CISO and deputy director for the City of San Diego. In that role, he spearheaded San Diego's Smart City initiative. "Gary has been at the leading edge of cybersecurity innovation for decades, most recently with his Smart City initiative for San Diego," said Webroot CFO John Post in a news release.

Jeff Norris

Apple has reportedly hired Jeff Norris, one of NASA's leaders in mission operations innovation, for Apple's augmented reality efforts. Apple did not respond to a request for comment.

Norris says on his website that he started several projects in virtual reality and augmented reality at NASA, where he has worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Specifically, Norris has worked on applying VR and AR to space exploration, he says on his site.

The Apple AR team that Norris has joined is working on products including AR glasses, as well as AR features for iPhone, according to a Bloomberg report.

Matt Cain

Couchbase announced it had hired a former president at Veritas, Matt Cain, as its new CEO. Cain has also joined the company's board.

Cain takes over for Bob Wiederhold, who began as CEO at Couchbase in 2010 and will stay on with the company as executive chairman.

Cain had served as president of worldwide field operations at Veritas until October, and had been with the company for two years. Before that, Cain held several executive roles at Symantec, and earlier on he spent a decade with Cisco.

Brendan Harrington

CTG disclosed in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that Brendan Harrington, chief financial officer and senior vice president of the company, had resigned "by mutual agreement." Harrington had worked for CTG since 1994 and had been the CFO since 2005.

The company said that John Laubacker had been named CFO, in addition to his roles as treasurer and senior vice president. Laubacker has worked at CTG for 21 years and has been its treasurer since 2006.

Art Coviello

Gigamon announced that cybersecurity veteran Art Coviello had joined its board of directors.

Coviello previously spent two decades at RSA, including as CEO of the company before its 2006 acquisition by EMC, and then overseeing the RSA division as an executive vice president at EMC. Coviello retired as executive chairman of RSA and EVP of EMC in early 2015. Coviello "is one of the most recognized and influential pioneers who defined the cybersecurity industry," said Gigamon Chairman Corey Mulloy in a news release.

Slawomir Ligier, et. al.

Cloud access security broker (CASB) Skyhigh Networks announced three executive appointments.

Slawomir Ligier has been named senior vice president of engineering. Ligier was most recently the vice president of product development at Barracuda Networks, and before that he held executive roles at SafeNet, Verisign and Symantec.

Dheeraj Khanna has been named vice president of technical operations. Khanna had most recently been with OneLogin as VP of technical operations. Before that, he headed technical operations at Workday and Zoosk.

Anand Ramanathan has been hired as vice president of product management. Ramanathan had previously held executive positions at Proofpoint and Cisco WebEx.

Jason Dishon

Nitel has hired Jason Dishon, formerly the channel chief at Windstream as its executive vice president of sales and marketing.

Dishon comes to Nitel after serving in a variety of roles at Windstream, culminating in the position of vice president of channel sales and operations. At Nitel, Dishon will be running sales, marketing and sales operations strategy and execution.

Sam Berg

Cazena announced it had hired technology sales veteran Sam Berg as its vice president of sales.

Berg had previously worked at SnapLogic for four years, and before that he held executive roles at VoltDB and Nexaweb Technologies. His 25-year career has also included positions at Ascential Software and SAP.