2026 Channel Chiefs: The 50 Most Influential

In celebration of CRN’s 2026 Channel Chiefs, here’s a look at 50 leaders who drive the channel agenda and evangelize the importance of partnerships within the IT industry.

The Most Influential

The pace of change is never slow with IT. But with the AI wave, combined with the economic uncertainty and geo-political upheavals of recent years, the IT industry has had to navigate some particularly treacherous waters.

IT vendors and the channel have had to adapt to rapid technology and economic shifts. And that has created some serious challenges for channel chiefs, the IT industry executives who manage their companies’ relationships with their channel partners and provide them with the incentives and resources they need to be successful.

Each year CRN offers its list of the industry’s leading channel chiefs, the channel executives and managers who rise to the challenge of maintaining relationships with partners, managing all-important channel programs, and advocating on behalf of the channel within their companies and across the IT industry at large.

All channel chief honorees are selected by CRN’s editorial staff on the basis of their professional achievements, standing in the industry, dedication to the channel partner community and strategies for driving channel growth and innovation.

In addition to the broader Channel Chiefs list, CRN assembles its list of the 50 Most Influential Channel Chiefs, an elite group drawn from the larger pool of channel chief honorees each year—leaders who drive the channel agenda and evangelize the importance of partnerships.

Over the last year, these channel chiefs have launched new partner programs, updated and expanded existing programs, recruited new solution providers, and taken additional steps to help their channel partners be successful.

At Cisco Systems, for example, Tim Coogan—just appointed as the company’s channel chief in August—has overseen the rollout of Cisco 360, a massive overhaul of the networking and security company’s partner program with new resources, tools and partner designations.

“I look at my experience at Cisco as an advantage,” Coogan told CRN in an interview in October. “Now, there are clearly things that I will learn in a new role through a new set of exposures, but what I anchor on is that in the 26 years that I’ve been with Cisco, and the 10 years prior to that in sales roles, they have all been involved in an environment where the OEM and the partner work together for common value delivery, common outcome delivery. And I have seen firsthand it’s not Cisco-led or partner-led, it is shoulder to shoulder, combining innovation and capability to the benefit of our common customer.”

A big part of a channel chief’s job is helping partners leverage new opportunities. At Schneider Electric, the $38 billion power and cooling giant, channel chief Gordon Lord has worked to provide partners with AI-based power infrastructure assessment capabilities that spur strategic conversations with customers.

“This is a great way for a partner to go call on their customer and for us to go mine our installed base together and to add real value to end customers,” Lord said in an interview with CRN. “In the process, we are driving more revenue and margin for the partner and Schneider Electric.”

At Nvidia, channel chief Craig Weinstein is likewise helping partners realize opportunities around “neoclouds,” smaller cloud service providers that compete with the giant hyperscalers to provide data center services for AI tasks such as AI training and inference workloads.

“We have many solution providers globally that are working hand in hand with some of the world’s most important neoclouds and tier-one cloud providers and helping them integrate and build their AI factories,” Weinstein told CRN.

The following 50 Most Influential Channel Chiefs slideshow includes information from channel chief applications (including material in quotes), CRN news stories and other sources.

The complete 2026 CRN Channel Chiefs list is available online at CRN.com.

Steven Burke, Dylan Martin and Gina Narcisi contributed to this story.

1Password

Larissa Crandall

Global VP, Channels, Alliances

Crandall joined 1Password in October and leads the company’s global partner ecosystem, driving strategic growth through transformative alliances.

Since joining 1Password, Crandall has continued to build out the company’s global partner organization, driving strategic investment priorities and focus areas. She has advised the entire organization, including product, go-to-market, finance, marketing and executive leadership teams, on how to embody a partner-first mindset to ensure that partners are at the forefront of how the company operates every day.

With over 25 years of experience in the channel, Crandall has built and scaled high-performing partner organizations that accelerate revenue, strengthen collaboration and deliver meaningful business outcomes. Throughout her career, she has implemented global frameworks that increase partner engagement, attract new strategic partnerships, and drive incremental demand and growth.

Before joining 1Password, Crandall held senior leadership roles at New Relic, Veeam Software and Gigamon, where she consistently expanded global partner engagement and delivered measurable growth.

Crandall began her career at Connection, a solution provider, where she led sales teams and developed a deep understanding of partner needs—a foundation that continues to inform her channel-first approach and ability to build trusted, lasting relationships.

Amazon Web Services

Ruba Borno

VP, Global Specialists, Partners

Borno is focused on bringing together the breadth of AWS and partner solutions to deliver the best possible business outcomes for customers.

Borno oversees the AWS specialists who provide customers with technical expertise on strategic services, segments and verticals and are responsible for the go-to-market strategy by technology domain. She is also responsible for ensuring AWS customers benefit from the AWS Partner Network, with over 140,000 partners in over 200 countries, that provides innovative solutions to technical and business challenges. She also leads the AWS Marketplace, inclusive of the Agents and Agentic Tools Marketplace.

Borno continues to meet with partners and customers to identify ways AWS can remove friction and help them grow, including evolving existing competencies and introducing new ones that recognize partner expertise. She also introduced a number of new innovations to the AWS Marketplace.

Prior to joining AWS, Borno held several leadership positions over the course of her six-year tenure with Cisco Systems. Most recently, she served as senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Global Customer Experience Centers, where she led a team of 18,000 engineers to deliver Cisco’s full services portfolio including technical, professional and managed services.

AMD

Jason Mooneyham

Corporate VP, Global Commercial Channel; North America Channel Chief

Mooneyham leads a team focused on CPUs, GPUs, NPUs and DPUs, as well as differentiated solutions for data center, cloud, client and edge computing for AMD’s largest channel partners. This includes how AI is interwoven into each solution to meet the most demanding technology needs across all verticals.

Over the past year, Mooneyham and his team expanded VAR support, launched the AMD Partner Advisory Board to strengthen strategic alignment, and initiated public sector channel coverage, enhancing AMD’s engagement and influence across key market segments.

In his previous position at AMD, Mooneyham served as corporate vice president of the Americas region covering the commercial, consumer and component customers, as well as corporate vice president of strategic accounts, including Lenovo, NEC, Fujitsu, Huawei, Samsung, LG, and Xiaomi. He initially served as corporate vice president of the Global Commercial Business at AMD upon joining in 2016.

Prior to joining AMD, Mooneyham served as vice president of public sector for Lenovo North America, overseeing the team that created solutions of Lenovo hardware, software and services targeted toward education, health care, and federal, state, and local government entities throughout North America.

Arctic Wolf

Bob Skelley

VP, Global Channel Strategy

Skelley leads the company’s expansion and development into new channel communities. He is currently focused on developing new routes to market through the channel and expanding the company’s presence in technical communities, influencer and agent models, marketplaces and systems integrators.

Skelley recently helped lead Arctic Wolf’s global channel expansion into EMEA, Latin America and Asia-Pacific, launching new distribution relationships in several regions. He has established new engagement communities, including a new technical champions community to grow the company’s marketplace footprint, and has helped drive adjacent services and increased profitability with Arctic Wolf.

Skelley has over 30 years of experience in sales leadership, business development, channel sales and marketing and in building high-performance leadership teams. Before joining Arctic Wolf, Skelley served in executive leadership roles at The Channel Company, Dell, Microsoft and EqualLogic.

Broadcom

Brian Moats

SVP, Global Commercial Sales, Partners

With over 20 years of experience in sales leadership, channel development and business strategy within the technology sector, Moats is committed to advancing Broadcom’s partner ecosystem and driving innovative opportunities for growth. He has been instrumental in fostering creative business models and practices with channel partners, including global systems integrators.

Over the last year, Moats led the global transformation of Broadcom’s partner ecosystem, aligning channel strategy to profitable growth. He drove execution across commercial and strategic segments, deepened partner engagement, and established predictable, value-based programs that strengthened alignment, improved enablement, and delivered measurable results through focus, clarity and disciplined execution.

Before stepping into his current role, Moats joined Broadcom through its acquisition of CA Technologies in 2018. Throughout his career he has held senior leadership positions where he transformed sales programs, strengthened channel alliances and delivered substantial revenue growth.

Cato Networks

Karl Soderlund

Global Channel Chief

Soderlund leads Cato Networks’ worldwide channel sales, charged with further expanding the company’s partner program and accelerating partner success in the SASE market.

Over the last year, Soderlund launched the Cato Networks Channel First Partner Program, a revamped global partner program with specialization tracks, tiers and zero up-front financial commitment. He also created Cato’s first-ever global SPIFF program and drove the consolidation of Cato’s channel organization in the Americas to streamline channel management across VAR/MSPs and agents.

Soderlund is a globally recognized channel leader with a proven track record of driving strategic growth and scaling partner ecosystems in cybersecurity and networking. With 30-plus years of experience, he has shaped high-performing channel strategies at some of the industry’s most influential companies.

Prior to Cato Networks, Soderlund served as senior vice president of worldwide partner and alliances sales at Zscaler and senior vice president of worldwide channel sales at Palo Alto Networks, where he delivered revenue growth, operational excellence and partner enablement at scale. His leadership experience spans executive roles at Imperva, Aruba Networks, HP, Fortinet and Cisco, reinforcing his deep expertise in building resilient, high-growth channel models.

Cisco Systems

Tim Coogan

SVP, Global Partner Sales

Coogan, named to his current role in August, leads Cisco’s global partner ecosystem, orchestrating relationships with over 38,000 partners through whom nearly 90 percent of Cisco’s revenue flows. He is responsible for scaling Cisco’s partner program across 165 countries and driving profitable growth through diverse routes to market.

In his first 90 days in his current post, Coogan conducted a global partner tour across the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Japan and China, and Europe, Middle East and Africa, directly engaging partner CEOs to build trust during program transformation. He helped design the Cisco 360 Partner Program with hundreds of partner touchpoints and personally championed partner profitability protection and One Cisco road map transparency.

Coogan brings 25-plus years of direct sales experience to partner leadership. Most recently, as senior vice president of U.S. commercial, he led over 2,000 field resources and drove more than $7 billion in annual sales. Previously, as area vice president of global enterprise, he guided customers across multiple industries through transformational technology adoptions.

Coogan’s leadership philosophy centers on durable growth, mutual profitability and shared customer success—principles central to Cisco’s evolution toward outcome-based partner programs.

Cisco Systems

Elisabeth De Dobbeleer

SVP, Cisco Partner Program

De Dobbeleer brings over two decades of diverse experience to her current role as leader of the Cisco Partner Program team. Guided by a mission to redefine how Cisco engages and delivers value through its ecosystem, she is leading the transformation behind the Cisco 360 Partner Program, shaping the future of profitable, outcome-driven partnerships.

De Dobbeleer and her team focus on accelerating profitable growth through innovative programs and incentives, driving Cisco preference and competitive advantage through practice building and service creation, and enhancing partner experience through simplified, modernized relationships.

Over the last year, De Dobbeleer led the team designing the new Cisco 360 Partner Program, redefining partner value with an architecture-based framework for diverse models. The program raises the bar and sets a new industry standard. By uniting go-to-market, incentives and engagement initiatives, Cisco is strengthening its partner ecosystem and customer impact.

Before assuming her current role, De Dobbeleer was a key member of the Cisco Transformation Center, focused on advancing new routes to market. In this capacity she collaborated closely with Cisco’s partners, the Global Partner Organization and cross-functional stakeholders to drive strategic transformation initiatives, including the recent launch and operationalization of the next generation of the Cisco Partner Incentive. Prior to that, De Dobbeleer served as the leader of Cisco’s Europe, Middle East, and Africa partner sales and routes to market.

Cloudflare

Tom Evans

Chief Partner Officer

Evans joined Cloudflare as chief partner officer in April 2024 and is responsible for the company’s partner ecosystem, focused on global market expansion and partner revenue growth.

Evans’ expertise lies in crafting comprehensive partner sales strategies and fostering alliances around emerging technologies. He has a transformative leadership approach and the ability to turn vision into reality when it comes to channel strategy and partner engagement.

Over the past year, Evans led the transformation of Cloudflare’s global partner ecosystem from design to execution, building a strong partner leadership team, streamlining the organization’s network to focus on high-impact partners, launching the enhanced Cloudflare PowerUP Partner Program, and introducing programmatic discounts that simplify engagement and improve partner profitability worldwide.

Believing that ecosystem partners are integral to business success and customers’ overall security posture, Evans leans into investing in partner growth by implementing tailored programs, providing strategic guidance, and extending incentives and ongoing support mechanisms.

Before joining Cloudflare, Evans was vice president of worldwide channel sales at Palo Alto Networks and previously held various senior leadership positions with K2 Software and F5 Networks.

Cohesity

Mark Conley

VP, Americas Channel Sales

In his current role at Cohesity, Conley and his team help channel partners address the growing demand for AI-powered data security and enable customers to unlock insight from their protected data.

Conley has worked closely with channel partners to provide clarity, continuity and confidence in Cohesity’s forward path. Strengthening longstanding relationships and building new ones have allowed the company to accelerate fast out of the gate and be well positioned for the opportunities ahead.

Conley has spent 40 years in the IT industry, from working a retail sales floor in the early days explaining RAM, ROM and floppy drives to potential first-time computer users, to running large channel organizations spanning the globe and responsible for billions of dollars of annual revenue. He previously managed partner organizations at Commvault and SolidFire.

Corero Network Security

Michelle Ragusa-McBain

Global Channel Chief; VP, Channel Sales

Ragusa-McBain recently joined Corero Network Security as the company’s global channel chief and head of channel sales.

Over the last year of her career, Ragusa-McBain has led the design and execution of global channel strategies for cybersecurity and SaaS organizations, overseeing the modernization of partner programs, launching services-led sales motions and aligning sales and marketing for scale.

At Corero Ragusa-McBain and her team are focused on expanding the company’s global partner ecosystem across MSSPs, telcos, ISPs and strategic VARs, strengthening its reach in enterprise and service provider markets.

She brings to the table a blend of cross-functional expertise in products, marketing, sales and customer success, making her a strategic catalyst for growth. Her experience spans channel sales, marketing, operations and partner enablement, making her uniquely equipped to accelerate revenue growth, enhance partner performance and scale innovative, customer-centric programs.

Ragusa-McBain has a proven record of building high-impact platforms, driving double-digit revenue growth, and launching differentiated offerings in hypercompetitive markets. She excels at unifying vision, execution and voice of the customer into scalable, profitable outcomes. And she brings a strategic, data-driven approach to channel enablement, partner marketing and ecosystem innovation.

Prior to joining Corero, Ragusa-McBain spent nearly three years at SonicWall, most of that time as the company’s channel chief and vice president of global channels and strategy.

CrowdStrike

Michael Rogers

VP, Global Alliances

Rogers leads global strategy and execution across all indirect routes to market, including solution providers, global systems integrators, service providers, technology alliances, hyperscalers, cloud marketplaces and OEMs.

Throughout his career, Rogers has focused on building high-impact sales and partnership ecosystems across enterprise, SMB and consumer segments. He is a strong advocate for creating partnerships rooted in clear value exchange and mutual success, ensuring that ISVs, partners and customers alike realize the full potential of their collaboration.

Over the past year, Rogers and his team accelerated partner innovation and collaboration, launching new programs across distribution, alliances, MSSPs and partner-led services. Through cross-functional teamwork, they introduced an enhanced Partner Services Program and certified hundreds of new partners, scaling how CrowdStrike delivers value to customers through its trusted global ecosystem.

Rogers has more than 27 years of cybersecurity industry experience, previously holding senior sales and alliance roles at McAfee, Sophos, Tanium and SecurityScorecard.

Dell Technologies

Denise Millard

Chief Partner Officer

Millard is responsible for delivering the promise of Dell Technologies to customers together with Dell’s most strategic partners and industry experts while leading Dell’s partner strategy and vision, engagement, program design and experience.

Millard describes herself as passionate about the value the company’s partner ecosystem brings to deliver purpose-built solutions for customers, and she is a vocal champion of partners’ impact and potential, both internally and externally.

Millard says her passion for connecting with customers and enabling sales and partner organizations has been a constant throughout her 25-year-plus career. She previously held senior executive roles leading alliances, sales operations, channel sales, learning and enablement, field marketing, sales strategy and professional services.

During her decade in partner-centric roles, she has launched partner services programs, managed top partner relationships, and drove program enablement to support direct and partner selling motions.

She played a vital role in the integration of Dell and EMC as a member of the Value Creation Integration Office focused on go-to-market integration and field readiness for the combined organization.

Dell Technologies

Darren Sullivan

SVP, Global Partner Program, Operations

Sullivan and his organization are focused on accelerating growth with Dell Technologies’ partner ecosystem by developing a top-notch partner program and modernizing the partner experience.

The scope of the Global Partner Program and Operations organization includes program strategy and design, partner enablement, partner rules of engagement compliance, partner program operations, end-to-end partner support and business transformation.

The organization’s business transformation efforts focus on modernizing the end-to-end partner experience and include investment strategy, delivery of automation and use of AI as well as change management and enablement.

Sullivan is a 25-year veteran of Dell Technologies. Prior to his current position, he led multiple global business transformation initiatives for sales that have enabled the business to modernize the buying experience, simplify the selling experience and provide increased insight into the business. He also served as EMC’s Global Channel and Alliances Operations lead from 2013 to 2015.

Eaton

Steve Loeb

VP, Marketing, Distributed IT

Loeb oversees the strategic direction and execution of marketing programs focused on advancing Eaton’s distributed infrastructure and connectivity solutions. In this role, he leads a team of North American marketing directors and collaborates with sales and product management teams to drive the company’s vision and strategy for the Distributed IT business.

Over the last year, Loeb has built strong strategic partner relationships that boost sales and customer satisfaction. By aligning Eaton’s channel strategy with shifting market needs and business goals, he has helped drive consistent growth and profitability.

Loeb previously served as vice president of Distributed IT sales, leading strategic initiatives centered on enhancing Eaton’s product offerings and market position in the industry.

Following Eaton’s acquisition of Tripp Lite in 2021, he took on the role of commercial integration leader, overseeing the successful sales and marketing integration in the Americas while also leading Tripp Lite’s U.S. sales and marketing strategy. Before the acquisition, Loeb served as director of application and strategic sales at Tripp Lite where he played a pivotal role in driving solution sales and strengthening relationships with key strategic accounts.

His career began at CDW, where he gained valuable experience in business development, sales and marketing across the power and connectivity industries.

Exabeam

Craig Patterson

Global Channel Chief

With more than two decades of experience, Patterson is known for building partner-first ecosystems that drive global scale, operational efficiency and profitable revenue growth.

Since joining Exabeam in 2025, Patterson has unified the company’s partner ecosystem under the Exabeam APEX Partner Program, a simplified, competency-based framework that empowers VARs, MSPs and MSSPs to grow through enablement, specialization and customer impact.

Under his leadership, Exabeam rolled out a new commercial model for MSSPs featuring multitenancy, pooled licensing and predictable margins. The program also introduced strategic tools like the Exabeam Nova Advisor Agent and

Outcomes Navigator.

Patterson has deepened Exabeam’s alliances with Optiv, GuidePoint Security and Lumifi to help partners deliver AI-driven threat detection at scale. And he championed regional investment across the U.K., India and the Middle East.

Patterson’s leadership reflects a shift from transactional engagement to service-led partner growth. His channel model rewards technical capability, customer retention and co-sell behavior, laying the foundation for long-term, scalable partnerships.

Before joining Exabeam, Patterson held executive channel roles at Aryaka Networks and Lumen Technologies, launching award-winning programs and managing billion-dollar indirect revenue portfolios.

Extreme Networks

Joe Spencer

SVP, Global Channels, Strategic Initiatives

Spencer uses his deep expertise in the networking space to drive global channel sales and growth initiatives. He is responsible for building and leading global channel sales teams and enabling growth through strategic alliances, channel partners, resellers and distributors, as well as driving the strategy, implementation and execution of Extreme’s go-to-market channel sales motions and programs.

Since joining Extreme, Spencer has helped drive multiple new initiatives to improve and modernize the company’s partner program, including redesigning several key offerings like deal registration and the rebate program with a focus on improving the value for Extreme and its partners.

Prior to Extreme, Spencer served as COO, Americas enterprise sales at Juniper Networks. He previously held senior strategic roles at Amazon Web Services, Zscaler and Cisco, where he played a key role in building and executing successful channel programs.

F5

Lisa Citron

VP, Global Partner Ecosystem

Citron is responsible for building and leading an ecosystem-centric go-to-market strategy to drive global revenue growth for F5 solutions and establish the company as a leader in multi-cloud application security and delivery services through all commercial routes to market.

Over the past year, Citron led the rollout of F5’s Application Delivery and Security Platform to the company’s partner ecosystem, sharing F5’s vision and $27 billion-plus market opportunity. She also devoted time to listening to partner feedback and securing incremental funding to drive partner AI initiatives, enabling partners to capture new opportunities and drive measurable growth and innovation.

Citron has a long history with F5, joining the company more than 14 years ago. Prior to her current role she served as vice president of North America channels, responsible for all regional commercial and public sector channel business. She has also held the role of senior director of cloud and channel sales, driving transformational change by developing the company’s public cloud go-to-market motions.

Prior to F5, Citron was vice president, worldwide channels and alliances at BlueCat Networks and director of global channels and alliances at NetForensics. She also held senior channel sales and marketing roles with Global Knowledge and McAfee over her 20-year career in the channel.

Fortinet

Landon Scott

VP, U.S. Channel Sales

Scott leads Fortinet’s U.S. channel sales organization with a focus on helping partners accelerate growth, capture new opportunities in SASE, SecOps, cloud and managed services, and maximize profitability through simplified programs and incentives.

Scott moved into the vice president of U.S. channel sales post in May 2025, expanding from operations to full channel leadership. During the last year he refined partner incentives, emphasized managed and professional services, and deepened engagement with strategic partners, MSSPs and carriers—ensuring a partner-first approach to growth and collaboration.

Scott is a 25-plus-year veteran of the network security industry. Since joining Fortinet in 2015, he has held leadership roles in channel operations and partner management, building on earlier experience at Juniper Networks, Radware, NetContinuum and Genicom. Known for his partner-first philosophy, he is dedicated to ensuring that partners have the resources, support and collaboration needed to succeed in a rapidly evolving market.

Google Cloud

Kevin Ichhpurani

President, Global Partner Ecosystem, Channels

Ichhpurani is responsible for Google Cloud’s most strategic partnerships with global technology companies, ISVs, systems integrators and channel partners that help scale offerings to thousands of customers around the globe.

Over the last year, Ichhpurani has overseen Google Cloud’s transition from a traditional channel model to a joint services approach, using data and AI for digital transformation in customer service, supply chain and distribution. He also mobilized partners to embrace the AI opportunity, fostering faster cloud adoption and AI leadership.

Ichhpurani brings more than 25 years of experience in the technology industry to his job, including leading global strategy, platform ecosystem transformation, direct and indirect sales, venture capital, and mergers and acquisitions. He has deep technology roots and has a keen interest in digital transformation using generative AI, as well as in cloud technologies, building and scaling technology ecosystems, and co-innovation with strategic partners.

Ichhpurani previously served as executive vice president and corporate officer at GE Digital, senior partner at EY, and executive vice president and head of the business development and global partner ecosystem at SAP.

HP Inc.

Kobi Elbaz

SVP, GM, Global Revenue Operations

Elbaz is responsible for directing HP Inc.’s global go-to-market model across all of the company’s solutions and services. His organization spans global channel strategy and sales; seller strategy, experience and enablement; customer and partner sales operations; and go-to-market transformation.

In 2025 Elbaz spearheaded the global rollout of Amplify AI, expanded persona-based enablement, and scaled HP’s SuperPower Booster incentives. Thirty percent of eligible partners have already benefited from SuperPower Booster. His focus on partner profitability, future-ready skills and simplified engagement has helped transform HP’s channel ecosystem into a consultative, AI-enabled growth engine.

Prior to his current role, Elbaz served as senior vice president and general manager of HP’s Global Channel Organization, responsible for all channel and partner-facing programming and engagement on a global scale, across the entire HP portfolio. Under his leadership, the company expanded the HP Amplify global channel program to all partners and integrated all HP products and services into one unified global platform.

Since joining HP in 1996, Elbaz has served in a variety of leadership roles including senior vice president and general manager of HP’s Global Personal Systems Category, vice president and general manager of Americas Personal Systems, vice president and general manager of EMEA Personal Systems, and country managing director for HP Israel.

HP Inc.

Scott Lannum

VP, GM, North America Commercial Channel Sales

Lannum is responsible for leading and managing all aspects of HP Inc.’s commercial channel sales in the Americas, spanning distribution, national solution providers, regional VARs, public sector, and SMB partners in the commercial channel.

Last year Lannum drove North America’s commercial channel success as interim managing director through a “One HP” approach. He strengthened the partner ecosystem, accelerated SMB growth with added resources, and positioned teams to win in the future of work—delivering sustained momentum, alignment and results.

Lannum has nearly 30 years of experience in sales, finance, supply chain and operations, including over 16 years with HP.

He previously served as vice president of U.S. distribution within the Americas Channels organization with primary responsibility for HP’s commercial distribution partners, as well as HP’s public sector channel and SMB. Prior to that, he was vice president of U.S. SMB sales within the Printing and Personal Systems teams, for which he was responsible for go-to-market strategy and sales execution in the SMB segments.

Before joining HP, Lannum held numerous leadership positions at Lexmark International, with a primary focus on printing solutions and services.

HPE

Jesse Chavez

VP, Worldwide Partner Strategy, Programs, Business Operations

Chavez’s charter is to enhance the HPE Partner Ready programs and unify all programs into the HPE Partner Ready Vantage program. He is responsible for overall channel strategy and driving the operational framework for key channel initiatives. He is also responsible for driving growth in the channel by partnering closely with channel leaders across geographies, the business units and channel marketing.

In 2025 Chavez was focused on delivering a new unified program, the HPE Partner Ready Vantage Framework, that recognizes partners’ expertise and partner-branded services capabilities. The new program covers HPE’s entire product portfolio and will include the Juniper Networks portfolio once product integration is complete in November 2026.

Chavez has also played a role in integrating the HPE hybrid IT, Aruba and Juniper channel teams into a single organization.

HPE

Simon Ewington

SVP, Worldwide Channel, Partner Ecosystem

Ewington leads HPE’s channel and partner ecosystem globally and is responsible for driving the ecosystem’s success and growth across the company’s full, end-to-end product portfolio, now including networking following the completion of the Juniper Networks acquisition.

With a focus on strengthening the core business, Ewington is dedicated to accelerating HPE’s edge-to-cloud strategy by fostering world-class innovation, delivering exceptional partner and customer experiences, and unlocking expanded growth opportunities for HPE’s global partner network. His leadership ensures that HPE’s partners are equipped to thrive in an increasingly dynamic and digital-first landscape, while delivering cutting-edge solutions that meet the evolving needs of customers worldwide.

Over the last year, Ewington led the unification of the HPE channel team, fostering a partner-first, One-HPE culture. He also unified multiple channel programs under the HPE Partner Ready Vantage Program and drove channel-led strategies that delivered significant revenue growth, reinforcing partner impact.

Ewington was previously vice president, worldwide distribution, at HPE, responsible for defining the overall HPE distribution strategy and driving profitable growth leveraging HPE’s routes to market and partner ecosystem.

Ewington joined HPE from HP Inc., where he was responsible for the Graphics Solutions Business EMEA, leading the $1.2 billion revenue graphics business and its 1,000 employees. Before that he held various channel leadership executive positions across both HPE and HP Inc. in a career stretching back to Hewlett-Packard since 1993.

HPE

Jeremiah Jenson

VP, North America Channel And Partner Ecosystem

Jenson, a 16-year HPE veteran, leads the HPE channel and partner business for North America and is responsible for the overall revenue, go-to-market and strategy for HPE’s channel business.

He is charged with spurring growth through scaling customer acquisition and partner activation, building scalable HPE practices to reach millions of customers across all market segments in North America.

In 2025 Jenson’s focus was on expanding partner opportunities and enhancing field engagement in alignment with HPE’s business priorities. This alignment enables the company to forge more meaningful and impactful collaborations, driving better results for all parties.

Jenson joined HPE in his current role in May 2025. Prior to that he spent seven years at AWS in global roles including global channel resell leader. Before that he worked at HPE in various sales and channel leadership roles for about 16 years. He brings over two decades of deep channel experience and technology experience, which have resulted in business growth for partners.

Intel

David Guzzi

VP, Commercial, Partner GTM; Global Channel Chief

Guzzi joined Intel in 2021 as general manager of global channel sales after serving as the CEO of Equus Compute Solutions. He was subsequently promoted to vice president, global channel chief, and most recently added responsibility for Intel’s global commercial go-to-market across Intel Products.

Last year Guzzi and his partner organization increased partner profitability and launched major partner benefit initiatives. These included a new deal registration program that covered multiple types of channel partners and three tiers of incentives and the adoption of an outcome-based MDF program focused on Intel and the partner achieving stated campaign goals. Guzzi also spearheaded a comprehensive refresh of the Intel Partner Alliance program that Intel said provided partners with more value, simplification and continuous innovation.

Guzzi is a proven C-suite leader with decades of high-impact results. He has over 35 years of deep experience with technology channels including systems integrators, solution providers, ISVs, MSPs, OEMs and distribution.

Intermedia Cloud Communications

Jonathan McCormick

COO, Head Of Sales

McCormick is responsible for operations, client services and global revenue at Intermedia Cloud Communications.

Since joining Intermedia in 2007, McCormick has been a driving force behind Intermedia’s partner-first strategy, helping to build one of the industry’s most trusted and profitable cloud communications ecosystems.

In 2025 McCormick led the evolution of Intermedia’s partner strategy including expanding service provider enablement, accelerating AI monetization across partner paths, and strengthening collaboration across sales, marketing and product teams. His focus was on equipping partners to deliver greater value, speed and profitability in an increasingly complex communications landscape.

McCormick’s philosophy remains consistent: empower partners, simplify technology, and deliver growth through excellence, trust and measurable results. He has guided the evolution of Intermedia’s multi-path partner model, enabling MSPs, VARs, and service providers to choose how they go to market, retain customer ownership, and earn significantly higher recurring revenue than traditional agent programs.

Under McCormick’s leadership, Intermedia achieved and has maintained its J.D. Power-certified support excellence and consistently delivers Net Promoter Scores above 80—proof of the company’s commitment to partner and customer satisfaction.

Kaseya

Dan Tomaszewski

EVP, Channel

Tomaszewski leads a team and a channel program across all of Kaseya’s business lines and 40,000-plus customers. He is passionate about enabling Kaseya’s customers (primarily MSPs plus some internal corporate IT departments) with consistent, relevant and custom-branded content, training and sales resources, so they can see faster and higher returns on their technology investment with Kaseya’s Powered Services and Goal Assist programs.

Tomaszewski says that relaunching the company’s digital community in 2025 has been transformative for customers. Kaseya’s increased investment in the platform has allowed the company to collaborate more openly with customers and share expertise through regular Ask Me Anything sessions with Kaseya product teams.

Tomaszewski has over 10 years of experience in channel success and management, including as the CEO of an MSP where he won multiple awards and honors for his business and community leadership. He also developed and delivered training programs for ID Agent, RapidFire Tools, Compliance Manager, Datto, IT Glue, AudIT, Vonahi and RocketCyber customers. He leverages his strong skills in MSP go-to-market and MSP marketing to create value for partners and stakeholders.

Lenovo

Pascal Bourguet

COO, Chief Of Sales Strategy; Channels Officer, International Markets

Bourguet leads all of Lenovo’s channel operations outside China and is responsible for growth through global systems integrators, the company’s sustainability-focused go-to-market strategy, sales transformation and long-term strategic planning.

Over the last year, Bourguet sought to expand the Lenovo 360 channel program by launching Lenovo 360 pathways, as well as simplifying incentive frameworks and accelerating partner specialization across AI, services and sustainability. His focus on enablement, collaboration and measurable business outcomes has strengthened partner trust, growth and differentiation across markets.

Before assuming his current post, Bourguet was vice president, North America chief category and marketing officer, where he oversaw Lenovo’s PC product management, business management, and marketing for commercial and consumer segments. During his tenure he doubled revenue and tripled profitability in three years through a combination of portfolio optimization, robust business planning and operational discipline.

Before Lenovo, Bourguet held senior leadership roles at HP across sales, channel and marketing in EMEA, the U.K. and Ireland.

With more than two decades in the industry, Bourguet has cultivated a reputation for fostering trust-based partnerships and building high-performance teams across cultures and continents. He has played a central role in evolving Lenovo’s channel and go-to-market model to meet the demands of a rapidly transforming industry—always with strong emphasis on execution, sustainability, and alignment with customer and partner success.

Lenovo

Wade McFarland

VP, North America Channels

McFarland leads the “One Lenovo” mission across all segments for the company’s channel partners.

With more than two decades of experience in the technology industry, McFarland is a seasoned sales leader and operationalist recognized for driving efficiencies, building collaborative teams and delivering results across diverse business needs.

Since joining Lenovo in August 2025, McFarland has partnered across the organization to continue investing in the company’s people and culture, two critical areas that help drive Lenovo’s success in the channel. He continues to look for ways to best train and enable his team to meet the needs of Lenovo’s partners and their customers.

Prior to joining Lenovo, McFarland spent 24 years at Dell Technologies, most recently as vice president of North America channel sales, North America distribution and channel acquisition, where he led a high-performing, inclusive sales organization of 300-plus and drove $19 billion in annual revenue.

Microsoft

Nina Harding

Corporate VP, Americas Enterprise Partner Solutions

Harding and her team work to drive customer transformation by empowering partners to unlock greater agility and efficiency.

The Microsoft Americas Enterprise Partner Solutions business is responsible for the overall health of the partner ecosystem. The organization is comprised of multiple partner-facing specialists who work in lockstep with partners to maximize the benefits customers realize from their Microsoft investments.

Over the last year, Harding deepened partner engagement through storytelling, executive connections and strategic skilling initiatives. She led efforts to amplify partner voices, foster trust and align go-to-market strategies. By staying close to the field, Harding surfaced insight that empowered partners to grow, innovate and succeed in a dynamic channel ecosystem.

Prior to joining Microsoft, Harding led a worldwide organization at Google to grow the company’s partner ecosystem. Before that she spent 13 years with SAP as the vice president of global business development and sales programming and held partner and customer leadership roles at Cacheon and Oracle.

Microsoft

Julie Sanford

VP, Global GTM, Programs, Operations

Sanford is responsible for the end-to-end go-to-market strategy across Microsoft’s commercial services partner ecosystem.

She oversees the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program through which Microsoft goes to market with its partners and is the primary way that the company engages and invests in its 500,000-plus partner ecosystem. Her team brings together the go-to-market strategy, programs and operational precision to accelerate growth and enhance partner experience across all partner segments.

In 2025 Sanford led global strategy and global organizational execution for the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program. She transformed partner skilling into a driver of ROI and pipeline acceleration and advanced co-sell motions that increased deal size and accelerated deal close time—resulting in an 84 percent higher win rate.

Under Sanford’s leadership, her team is dedicated to driving innovation and delivering value to partners, helping them leverage Microsoft’s cloud and AI technology to grow their business and deliver improved customer outcomes.

N-able

David Weeks

VP, Partner Experience

Weeks works side-by-side with N-able’s top-performing service providers and global partner community. A big part of his role is to listen to and engage with partners to better understand their needs, share ideas more freely, and provide them with valuable insight into the current market conditions.

Weeks also offers strategic sales and marketing recommendations to partners and spearheads many of the tactical initiatives at N-able that define what the company does next.

In 2025 he worked with multiple global customers to help drive new high-value programs and support the go-to-market plan.

As a regular presenter at global and regional events, Weeks is all in on helping partners scale their success.

Nutanix

David Gwyn

SVP, Worldwide Channels

As a subscription software company whose go-to-market is exclusively through partners, Nutanix relies on the channel organizations that Gwyn oversees to drive sales, services and effective adoption throughout the customer subscription life cycle.

Gwyn says that in 2025 Nutanix “achieved incredible channel growth,” delivering an outsized number of new logos and repositioning the company’s strategy given that market momentum. His organization helped partners transition from focusing on hyperconverged infrastructure to the Nutanix cloud platform, introduced Kubernetes-ready solutions, and rearchitected partner performance with a new Premier Tier that drove stronger alignment, profitability and ecosystem growth.

Prior to joining Nutanix in 2012, Gwyn held leadership positions in sales and consulting at VMware, BEA, Plumtree, Silverstream, Sybase and Powersoft. He spent the early part of his career as a programmer, including four years on NASA's Hubble Space Telescope program.

Nvidia

Craig Weinstein

VP, America’s Partner Organization

Weinstein oversees Nvidia’s strategic partnerships and channel operations across North and South America. He leads Nvidia’s partner strategy that’s focused on expanding adoption of AI, generative AI and accelerated computing solutions across industries through a diverse partner ecosystem.

Under Weinstein’s leadership, Nvidia’s North American partner ecosystem has grown to more than 500 organizations, representing a 42 percent increase year over year. Channel and alliance activities now contribute roughly 80 percent of the company’s overall revenue.

Weinstein’s 2025 strategic priorities included developing partners’ AI infrastructure capabilities, strengthening professional services delivery, and expanding focus into new domains such as robotics and physical AI.

For 2025 achievements Weinstein cites the talent growth and promotions in Nvidia’s America’s Partner Organization, the recognition of top America’s partners at Nvidia GTC, the launch and impact of Nvidia Blueprints to accelerate the adoption of Nvidia software in the enterprise, and the inaugural America’s Partner Advisory Board with the company’s top 21 partners.

Weinstein is widely regarded for a leadership style grounded in collaboration, partner enablement and mentorship. His approach emphasizes building long-term, capability-driven relationships with partners that align with Nvidia’s AI and accelerated computing vision. Weinstein’s work has positioned Nvidia’s America’s Partner Organization as a core growth engine for the company.

OpenText

Mike DePalma

VP, SMB Business Development

DePalma joined OpenText in March 2025, tasked with strengthening the company’s channel strategy, expanding market share and leveraging the company’s long-standing partnership with Microsoft.

Since DePalma joined OpenText, the company’s channel division has had some of its best quarters in company history. In an interview with CRN in July, DePalma outlined his plans for rebuilding the company’s partner program, launched later in the year with a clear focus on the MSP channel, with new sales enablement, co-brandable content and automation front and center.

DePalma has over a decade of experience in the MSP ecosystem and is recognized for his expertise in fostering high-value partnerships and leading strategic business development initiatives.

Prior to joining OpenText, DePalma served as senior vice president of MSP enablement at Kaseya and was the vice president of business development at Datto, contributing to the company’s growth and channel strategies.

Palo Alto Networks

Michael Khoury

VP, Global Ecosystems Partners

Khoury joined Palo Alto Networks in 2024 to lead the evolution of the company’s worldwide partner program. As part of his charter, Khoury reimagined the relationship Palo Alto Networks holds with the channel ecosystem, building a program based on value exchange, re-investment opportunities and room for growth.

Khoury’s partner-first approach is the North Star for driving greater success for Palo Alto Networks and its global network of partners to deliver cybersecurity solutions to customers around the world.

For 2025 achievements, Khoury says Palo Alto Networks’ partner program has evolved to more effectively serve the needs of partners across all routes to market. That includes improved training, enablement and certification requirements; new self-service tools for closing deals faster; and better targeted rebates and discounts.

Prior to joining Palo Alto Networks, Khoury was the head of partner strategy and programs at ServiceNow, where he developed a multiyear strategy for partner engagement that included an innovative investment model and a more synergetic relationship with the company’s global strategy. He deepened his knowledge and experience of working with the channel during his 14 years at Cisco where partner profitability, incentives and a strong pricing strategy helped partners grow their network performance year over year.

Pure Storage

Hope Galley

VP, Americas Partner Sales

Galley joined Pure Storage in March 2025 and during her first nine months she focused on listening, strengthening partner profitability, scaling certifications and preserving Pure’ Storage’s hallmark ease of doing business.

In 2025 Galley focused on listening to partners and channel teams with the goal of improving Pure Storage’s channel strategy. She strengthened the company’s partner-first approach by simplifying processes, increasing profitability and enhancing ease of business. Moves to refine the partner program and expand certifications have resulted in partners being more connected, motivated and positioned for growth across the Americas.

Last year, under Galley’s leadership, Pure Storage’s Americas Channel organization launched a modernized partner program designed to increase partner profitability, simplify engagement, and meet partners where they are in their transition to subscription and as-a-service models. This included updated tiering, refreshed enablement, enhanced incentives, and clearer pathways for partners to differentiate and grow recurring revenue.

Galley is a 30-year channel veteran recognized for her close partner partnerships and ability to drive transformative growth. Her deep market knowledge and proven leadership make her a trusted advocate across the channel. Before joining Pure Storage, she held the post of vice president of channel sales, Americas, at Juniper Networks.

Red Hat

Jennifer Heard

SVP, Global Commercial Sales

Heard is an accomplished leader with over 30 years of global sales experience within the technology sector. In her current role she leads a partner-first sales organization to accelerate growth by leveraging the organization’s high-valued, trusted ecosystem.

During her time, Heard has built the first partner-driven sales strategy for Red Hat and has accelerated double-digit growth three years in a row, resulting in a doubling of revenue, exceeding $1 billion in business in 2025.

Heard describes her mission as ensuring that the commercial sales segment is a 100 percent indirect business. Over the past year, she and her team aligned nearly 100 percent of selling motions with partners to become a partner-led commercial sales organization. In addition, her organization increased its focus on specialized partner capabilities to support critical areas in emerging technology, driving improved partner profitability and partner services opportunities.

Heard previously spent four years as senior vice president of cloud alliances at Turbonomic, an application resource management software company, where she built a strong cloud alliance with Microsoft, AWS and Google. Prior to that, she spent 22 years at Microsoft as worldwide vice president for corporate accounts and partner sales and delivered consistent double-digit growth while transforming the partner ecosystem.

Schneider Electric

Gordon Lord

VP, U.S. Channel Sales Organization, Secure Power

Lord is responsible for driving revenue, strategy and profitability within the U.S. Channels organization, with an increased focus on software, services and sustainability.

Lord says 2025 was a transformative year as he and his team worked to further align Schneider Electric’s Channel Sales Organization with partner needs to accelerate sales of the company’s EcoStruxure IT software.

Those efforts included the launch of Gateway program benefits and Power Infrastructure Assessment tools and services, creating new partner opportunities. It also included hosting the company’s second Channel Partner Executive Summit to strengthen collaboration and Schneider Electric's value proposition.

In an interview with CRN in November, Lord said the biggest opportunities for channel partners are around software products such as the company’s EcoStruxure platform and the infrastructure assessment services that software creates.

Lord, who has been in his current post for two and a half years, has been with Schneider Electric for nearly 30 years, holding a number of sales, distribution and channel management roles. Prior to his current appointment, Lord served as the senior director of IT distribution and channel strategy at the company.

SentinelOne

Brian Lanigan

SVP, Global Partner Ecosystem

Lanigan describes his mission as empowering SentinelOne’s worldwide ecosystem of interconnected partnerships to develop leading-edge offerings and solutions that accelerate customer value.

Last year, Lanigan’s partner organization strategically revamped the SentinelOne Partner Program to deliver substantially deeper, differentiated investments and resources, exclusively rewarding the company’s most committed and strategic partners. And in 2025 the company’s MSP channel demonstrated significant momentum across all global markets.

Lanigan also oversaw the successful buildup of the sales engineering organization to meet the increasing demands of the business, providing a deep bench of technical specialists to enable and support partners and customers.

Lanigan joined SentinelOne from Lacework, where he was the head of worldwide channels and alliances, evolving the company’s predominantly direct model to an 85 percent-plus partner-aligned business. He helped establish Lacework as a top AWS partner and the cloud security offering for six of the top eight MDR providers.

Lanigan also previously worked as the head of global strategic alliances at Splunk where he helped build the partner ecosystem as the company scaled from $200 million to $2.6 billion during his eight-year tenure.

ServiceNow

Michael Park

SVP, Global Partnerships, Channels

Park leads ServiceNow’s global ecosystem strategy and is responsible for driving partner-led growth across consulting, implementation, resale, managed services and ISV routes to market.

Park, who assumed his current post in June 2025, stepped into the role at a pivotal moment for ServiceNow and the industry with the shift to AI-powered business transformation. He has since set a clear, partner-first vision—one that positions the ecosystem as a multiplier for customer value and company growth.

Under Park’s leadership, ServiceNow has accelerated partner capability, capacity and AI readiness worldwide. He championed early access AI programs that allow select partners to co-innovate on key technologies such as AI agents and agent-to-agent before general availability. He also sponsored major enablement expansions, including initiatives projected to support more than 37,000 new certifications by 2026. Internally, he launched Project Lumina, an effort to apply AI to partner operations, eliminating manual work and giving teams more time to support partners and customers.

Park previously served as ServiceNow’s CMO and global head of AI go-to-market, leading the company’s brand reinvention and positioning ServiceNow as a leading AI platform for enterprise transformation.

Altogether Park has more than 25 years of enterprise technology experience across ServiceNow, Microsoft, HP, SAP and Siebel Systems.

Sophos

Scott Barlow

Chief Evangelist, Global Head, MSP, Cloud Alliances

Barlow serves as a next-generation cybersecurity leader in network and endpoint security services and solutions, leading global cloud alliances and the MSP business direction at Sophos. He drives worldwide sales with an emphasis on go-to-market strategies that accelerate revenue through marketing programs and relationships with service providers including MSPs, MSSPs, CSPs, telecommunications companies, online marketplaces and cloud providers.

Barlow is an industry-recognized thought leader with strong technical expertise and domain knowledge in cloud services and SaaS markets.

Through 2025 Barlow accelerated global MSP growth by expanding into Latin America, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Iberia, strengthening regional engagement through recruitment, on-boarding and enablement programs that drive scale and profitability. He introduced MSP Elevate, rewarding top MSPs with rebates, solution bundles and architect vouchers to boost growth, efficiency and customer value.

Prior to joining Sophos, Barlow was vice president of sales and marketing at Reflexion Networks, which Sophos acquired in 2015.

Sophos

Chris Bell

SVP, Global Channel Sales, Alliances, Corporate Development

Bell drives Sophos’s global go-to-market strategy, empowering the company’s 25,000 partners worldwide to accelerate growth, expand their capabilities, and build successful, scalable businesses.

Over the past year, he transformed Sophos’s channel engagement operations, launching a new partner program and competitive rebates and building out Partner Care. Bell also initiated what Sophos calls a “strategic ecosystem expansion” that expanded innovative routes to market through deepened partnerships with cyber insurance providers, online marketplaces, global systems integrators and managed security service providers. In addition, he expanded innovative routes to market through cyber insurance, alliance, global systems integrator and MSSP partnerships. These initiatives simplified partner engagement and accelerated mutual growth.

Bell also oversaw the implementation of next-generation quoting system enhancements—with automated distributor sharing—that reduced quote processing time by 70 percent.

Bell joined Sophos and took on his current role in February 2025 when Sophos acquired Secureworks, where he held the post of chief strategy officer.

Tenable

Jeff Brooks

SVP, Channels, Alliances

Brooks oversees Tenable's relationships with channel partners, distributors, MSSPs, resellers and strategic partners/systems integrators on a global basis. He also owns the Tenable channel partner program and operations, as well as the company’s High Velocity business.

Brooks’s recent achievements include developing a new license usage telemetry program for partners to assist in customer consumption and renewals, launching the GSI accelerator project to drive services for global systems integrators, and providing a new “tech touch” capability for existing customer renewals base to accelerate use, reduce churn and expand licenses. He also oversaw the new guaranteed margin program and ran global partner bootcamps.

Brooks has over 25 years of experience in cybersecurity sales and leadership positions. Previous roles include vice president of SaaS sales at Secureworks and various senior sales leadership positions at RSA. He also worked at Rational Software, Powersoft and Q+E Software.

ThreatDown

Kendra Krause

GM

Krause is a seasoned sales and channel executive with over 25 years of global experience scaling revenue engines and building high-impact partner ecosystems for leading cybersecurity and technology companies.

As general manager for ThreatDown, the corporate business unit of Malwarebytes, Krause is shaping the company’s channel-first strategy to deliver stronger outcomes for customers and partners. She leads the advancement of the ThreatDown product portfolio while evolving go-to-market programs for resellers, MSPs and distribution. She is also expanding go-to-market capabilities to accelerate growth and strengthen customer and partner engagement.

Krause joined ThreatDown in July 2025 and in just her first three months she restructured the sales team to better empower partners, launched a new partner program and rolled out new partner incentives.

Recognized for her ability to transform partner programs into competitive differentiators, Krause has deep expertise in global go-to-market strategy, MSP channel development and international market expansion. She has overseen complex global sales transformations, developed best-in-class partner portals, and unified direct and indirect sales organizations to accelerate growth.

Krause previously served as senior vice president of global channels at Sophos, where she led the global channel sales team, doubling channel billings, expanding the company’s partner ecosystem, and launching and scaling a global MSP program.

Prior to Sophos, she held executive roles at Fortinet, where she drove fourfold growth in channel revenue and built a reputation for developing scalable, incentive-based partner programs that deliver measurable ROI.

Veeam Software

Kevin Rooney

VP, Channel, Americas

Rooney is responsible for sales, strategy and execution across all indirect routes to market for the Americas, including through solution providers, corporate resellers, public sector partners, service providers, alliances and distributors.

In 2025 he collaborated extensively with Veeam partners to identify upsell and cross-sell opportunities within the shared customer base, delivering solutions that address key business challenges.

Rooney has more than 25 years of experience in high-tech sales and leadership positions at companies including VMware and Hewlett-Packard.

While at VMware, he managed the vCloud Air partner sales organization, helping to implement the indirect cloud strategy that led to thousands of new customers coming onto the platform.

Prior to VMware, Rooney spent six years at Hewlett-Packard, including two years as general manager for HP’s South Pacific Enterprise Group business and before that managing HP’s national partner team, responsible for the company’s largest partners. He also previously held channel leadership positions at Pillar Data Systems, Quantum and Fujitsu.

Wasabi Technologies

Marty Falaro

EVP, COO

Falaro oversees Wasabi’s sales, business development, engineering, product management and customer support teams. With a wealth of tech industry experience, he excels in crafting go-to-market strategies, managing corporate P&L and driving strategic partnerships.

Over the last year, Falaro focused on expanding Wasabi’s global distribution strategy, aligned with the growth of top alliances in key verticals. He also continued to build out a global channel-oriented sales and business development organization designed to position Wasabi as an ingredient of alliance solutions that the company takes to market through global distribution, VAR and MSP channels.

Before joining Wasabi, Falaro held senior leadership positions at major industry players like Oracle and Cisco Systems, as well as several high-growth, venture-backed startups, where he honed his expertise in scaling businesses and leading transformative growth.

WatchGuard Technologies

Michelle Welch

CMO; SVP, Business Strategy

Welch joined WatchGuard in 2015 and is responsible for shaping the company’s growth and transformation initiatives. As CMO she oversees the development and execution of WatchGuard’s global marketing strategy and channel operations team. And as the senior vice president of business strategy, she leads critical cross-functional initiatives focused on fueling operational excellence and company evolution.

Welch’s focus is on enabling WatchGuard’s partner ecosystem to deliver critical security protections for organizations battling increasingly sophisticated threats. She and her team support WatchGuard’s channel community and mission to make enterprise-grade security accessible to businesses of all types and sizes through simplicity.

In 2025 Welch oversaw the launch of the Partner Accelerate Program, an expansion of the company’s partner enablement program that provides qualified MSPs with intensive pre- and post-GA training covering all facets of technical, sales and operational readiness. The program was invitation-only and had a waitlist all year.

Prior to joining WatchGuard, Welch served as vice president of marketing at SafeNet, one of the world’s largest information security companies, where she rebuilt the company’s channel program and partner enablement platform. Throughout her career she has served in a variety of product, field, sales operations and corporate marketing leadership roles and brings more than 21 years of experience in security-focused B2B marketing to WatchGuard.

Zscaler

Anthony Torsiello

SVP, Global Partner Ecosystem

As the head of Zscaler’s global partner ecosystem team, Torsiello leads the strategy that empowers Zscaler’s global partner ecosystem to drive innovation, accelerate growth and deliver exceptional outcomes to customers. His visionary leadership ensures that Zscaler and its partners achieve success together in an ever-evolving digital landscape.

Over the past year, Torsiello has focused on ensuring that partnering with Zscaler is profitable and predictable. By collaborating with partners in the field and building frameworks aligned to customer needs, he and his team have empowered partners to grow, drive transformational deals, and deliver exceptional value in a competitive, yet opportunity-rich, landscape.

Prior to joining Zscaler, Torsiello spent over a decade at ServiceNow where he most recently held the role of group vice president of global partnerships and channels. During his tenure, he played a pivotal role in building a vibrant partner ecosystem that fueled ServiceNow’s exponential growth from approximately $1 billion to approximately $10 billion in subscription revenue.

Before ServiceNow, Torsiello spent 13 years at EMC, holding several senior sales and sales management positions, including global account manager for some of the largest customers in the financial services and life sciences sectors. He began his career in 1996 at ADP.