30 Notable IT Executive Moves: September 2017

Start It Off

Major appointments and departures at IT giants dominated our roundup of executive moves in September. Some of the most notable moves came in connection with the sweeping restructuring at Hewlett Packard Enterprise and the continued evolution of the unified Dell EMC. Meanwhile, other companies with changes in their channel exec ranks during the month included Google, Fortinet and Ruckus.

In the following slides, check out our picks for the 30 most significant executive moves affecting the channel in September.

Phil Davis

In September, Hewlett Packard Enterprise appointed a new global sales leader, Phil Davis, following the exit of U.S. sales chief Jim Merritt and EMEA sales chief Andy Isherwood.

Davis, a 17-year technology sales veteran, had been the regional managing director of Asia-Pacific for HPE's Enterprise Group, and has been with the company for four years overall. He'll take the role of chief sales officer effective Nov. 1, the start of HPE's fiscal year 2018.

Davis is "a great partner to our customers and with the channel," who "innovates by actively pushing our team to evolve our sales techniques," said HPE President Antonio Neri in an email to employees.

Merritt and Isherwood are retiring from HPE after they assist with the transition into the first quarter of the company's fiscal 2018.

Denzil Samuels

Incoming HPE Global Sales Chief Phil Davis has named HPE Global Channel Chief Denzil Samuels to oversee a new combined channel and alliances organization.

Under the restructuring, HPE has combined all indirect organizations (value-added resellers, channel programs/operations, big system integrators, India IT conglomerates, top ISV alliances, Internet of Things, and OEM partnerships) under a single Channel and Alliances organization headed by Samuels, who reports to Davis.

Among Samuels' direct reports is George Hope, the former top global sales executive for SimpliVity, which was acquired by HPE earlier this year. Hope will oversee HPE's top partner accounts and channel enablement.

Six-year HPE veteran Jesse Chavez will continue to oversee worldwide channel programs.

Dan Belanger

Incoming Hewlett Packard Enterprise Global Sales Chief Phil Davis has named his 11 geography sales chiefs, including the appointment of HPE sales veteran Dan Belanger to lead the North American business. Belanger had most recently been overseeing the East Region Americas for HPE.

The other top sales chiefs for the new HPE regions are Gilles Thiebaut, France; Heiko Meyer, Germany, Austria and Switzerland (also known as DACH); Marc Waters, United Kingdom and Ireland; Jose Maria de la Torre, Southern Europe; Luc Opdebeeck, Northern Europe; Johannes Koch, Middle East, Africa & Eastern Europe; Alfredo Yepez, Latin America; Narinder Kapoor, Asia-Pacific; Hitoshi Yoshida, Japan; and Som Satsangi, India.

Terry Richardson

HPE North America Sales Chief Dan Belanger has put a new management team in place with Terry Richardson overseeing channels and alliances.

Richardson, a 30-year channel veteran who had managed all of the HPE's enterprise partner business, will now be head of channels and alliances in North America.

Among the other Belanger appointments are: Andrew Manners, a 17-year HPE veteran, to head up Hybrid IT Sales; Jas Sood, an 18-year HPE veteran, who will oversee all SMB field sales; Joe Ayers, a four-year HPE veteran and former Dell executive, to head up public sector sales; and Dave Twohy, a 16-year HPE veteran, to oversee Pointnext Services.

Scott Dunsire

Several additional channel executives are leaving Hewlett Packard Enterprise as part of the HPE Next restructuring initiative. They include Scott Dunsire, an 11-year HPE veteran widely credited with making broad channel improvements, and Mike Parrottino, a 30-year HPE veteran who was a passionate advocate for partners and the SMB route to market.

Both Dunsire and Parrottino increased the percentage of sales going through the channel, initiating a mandate to drive 100 percent of SMB sales through partners.

Dunsire and Parrottino will work on the channel transition through the end of the HPE fiscal year, Oct. 31, sources told CRN.

David Goulden

Dell EMC infrastructure chief David Goulden announced he is leaving the company at the end of its fiscal year in early February. He'll be succeeded by Jeff Clarke, the company's vice chairman for operations and technology.

Goulden spent more than a decade with EMC before its $58 billion acquisition by Dell one year ago.

His announcement came shortly after Dell Technologies reported flat revenue and declining demand for its storage solutions.

The move will put Clarke, a 30-year Dell veteran, in charge of the company's product business, leading its Client Solutions Group and its Infrastructure Solutions Group.

Scott Millard

To get more aggressive in its storage business, Dell EMC is making Virtustream Channel Chief Scott Millard the company's vice president of specialty sales.

Dell EMC Channel Chief John Byrne tapped Millard for the newly created position. Millard reports directly to Byrne.

Millard began working at EMC in 2000, and was serving as vice president of sales Americas channel when the data storage giant was acquired by Dell. He was then named vice president of sales, global channels and alliances, at Virtustream.

John Chambers

After 26 years spent building the most powerful networking company in the world, Cisco Systems chairman and former longtime CEO John Chambers will no longer have a role inside the company as he will not seek re-election to the board of directors in December. "It is time for Cisco to move on to its next generation of leadership, including at the board and chairman level," Chambers wrote in an email to Cisco's board of directors.

When Chambers' term expires Dec. 11, the board plans to appoint Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins as chairman.

Chambers served as Cisco's CEO from 1995 to 2015. He joined the company in 1991 as head of sales, and has been a member of the board since 1993.

Cisco said Chambers is set to be given the honorary title of Chairman Emeritus.

Bertrand Yansouni

Google channel chief Bertrand Yansouni is preparing to depart less than a year after he took the reins of the company's expanding partner program, Google said in September. Google didn't specify when Yansouni will officially be leaving and hasn't named a successor yet.

Yansouni was recruited to the position of vice president for global partner sales and alliances in November 2016 by Diane Greene, who heads Google Cloud and was his former boss at VMware.

Yansouni came to Google from Cloudera, where he led the data management firm's partner program.

During his tenure, Yansouni oversaw changes in Google's go-to-market organization that aligned sales agents more by accounts, instead of product lines. Yansouni also eliminated an incentive in Google's compensation structure for salespeople to take deals direct – an element long derided by channel partners.

Joe Sykora

Fortinet channel chief Joe Sykora left the security vendor in late September, multiple sources told CRN.

Sykora had served as vice president of Americas channels and enhanced technologies. He has been replaced by Jon Bove, who most recently served as senior director of North American channels at Proofpoint. Before joining Proofpoint, Bove had worked at Fortinet as regional vice president of U.S. channels.

Fortinet confirmed Sykora's departure and Bove's appointment.

Sykora had been with Fortinet since 2010, holding a variety of marketing and channel sales leadership roles at the security vendor. He did not respond to calls for comment from CRN.

Raelyn Kritzer

Ruckus has a new channel leader to lead partners through the company's transition to becoming part of Arris International later this year.

Raelyn Kritzer, a longtime Brocade Communications partner champion, will take the channel chief position left open when Sandra Glaser Cheek left in August. Kritzer had served as senior director of worldwide partner programs and enablement for Brocade, and has been with the company for 16 years.

Brocade acquired Ruckus last year for $1.2 billion. Brocade-Ruckus is set to be acquired by Broadcom by the end of October for $5.9 billion; Broadcom plans to then immediately sell Ruckus and its IP networking business to Arris.

Kritzer has led Brocade's partner marketing efforts for more than a decade, holding positions such as director of worldwide partner marketing and senior manager of worldwide partner marketing.

Vasu Jakkal

FireEye named former Brocade marketing executive Vasu Jakkal as its new chief marketing officer in September.

Jakkal most recently served as vice president of corporate marketing for Brocade, which has agreed to be acquired by Broadcom. Jakkal left Brocade in August, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Jakkal replaces former FireEye CMO Kara Wilson, who left the company in July to take a role as chief marketing officer at IPO hopeful Rubrik.

Amy Fuller

Accenture has hired a new marketing leader, Amy Fuller, from rival Deloitte.

Fuller will take over as Accenture's chief marketing and communications officer on Jan. 1, though she has already joined Accenture as a member of the company’s Global Management Committee.

The current chief marketing and communications officer at Accenture, Roxanne Taylor, will retire from the company on Aug. 31, 2018. Taylor has spent a decade as CMO at Accenture and 22 years total at the company.

Fuller comes to Accenture after nearly five years as senior managing director of global brand for Deloitte. Earlier, she spent seven years at MasterCard, where she spearheaded deployment of the well-known "Priceless" marketing campaign.

Tom Flink

Forcepoint has landed former Citrix and RES Software channel exec Tom Flink to lead its channel sales.

Flink joined Forcepoint as vice president of global channel sales. He replaces Vice President of Global Channel Sales and Professional Services John Starr, who left the company earlier this year to take a role as operating partner at H.I.G. Capital.

Flink joins Forcepoint from RES Software, where he served as senior vice president of global sales and services. Before that, he held top sales and channel roles at Citrix, including as vice president for worldwide channel and market development.

Meg Whitman

Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Meg Whitman joined the board of directors at Dropbox in September.

Whitman "will help Dropbox reach new heights," Dropbox CEO Drew Houston wrote in a blog post. Dropbox has been valued at $10 billion by its investors, and some reports have suggested that an initial public offering could be coming for the company by the end of the year.

In June 2016, Whitman highlighted a deal that saw Dropbox move some of its cloud storage services business to an HPE cloud solution from Amazon Web Services.

In an interview with CRN in September, Whitman said she is firmly committed to leading HPE into the future.

John DeLozier

CenturyLink has pinned down its new channel leadership team that will head up the partner program following the close of its merger with fellow telecom Level 3 Communications.

John DeLozier, currently CenturyLink's vice president of the Channel Alliance program, will be splitting the role of channel chief with Level 3's vice president of indirect sales, Garrett Gee.

Effective at the start of 2018, DeLozier's new title will be vice president, indirect strategic partnerships and alliances for CenturyLink. In his role, DeLozier will be responsible for the company's top 25 strategic partners globally. Gee will be responsible for execution in the field, including sales within CenturyLink's territories.

CenturyLink's merger with Level 3 is expected to close in mid-to-late October, but channel operations will remain "business as usual" until 2018, DeLozier told CRN.

Dick Williams

Following an evolution that took it from its web security roots to a cloud-based security company, Webroot is now undergoing yet another transformation, following the retirement of CEO Dick Williams in September. Williams, who had been with Webroot since 2009, has been succeeded by former Lancope CEO Mike Potts.

Potts had served as CEO of network security company Lancope starting in 2010, and led the firm's $452 million acquisition by Cisco Systems in 2015. Since 2015, he had served as an integration executive at Cisco. Before that, he held CEO roles at AirDefense and ClickFox, as well as leadership roles at Jacada and MSA.

Peter Weber

Third-party maintenance powerhouse Curvature has appointed a new CEO eight months after the completion of its merger with SMS.

Peter Weber, an industry veteran who previously held the top executive roles at Carpathia and SevenSpace, replaces John Wozniak as CEO of Curvature. Weber began serving as executive chairman of the combined firm's board of directors in February.

Under Weber's leadership, data center and cloud services provider Carpathia was acquired by QTS Realty Trust in 2015. Weber also led SevenSpace, a managed services provider that he co-founded, to an eventual purchase by Sun Microsystems.

Curvature didn't specify what role Wozniak, who had served as CEO of SMS since 2011, will hold moving forward.

Tom Axbey

Cloud management vendor CloudHealth Technologies got a new CEO in September, Tom Axbey, who told CRN he aims to continue the company's fast growth pace.

"To be able to walk into a rapidly growing company with an expansive technology roadmap, with a full balance sheet, is sort of a dream come true. No changes are needed. It's just how quickly can we scale this," Axbey told CRN.

Axbey, who spent almost a decade as CEO of Rave Wireless (now Rave Mobile Safety), is taking over from CloudHealth founder Dan Phillips, who will serve as chairman of the board of directors. Phillips had been CEO at CloudHealth since its founding in 2012.

Drew Henry

Chip designer ARM Holdings has hired a former SanDisk IoT luminary to lead its server and networking business.

Drew Henry, who has taken the role of senior vice president and general manager for infrastructure at ARM, said in a statement he would help "build the infrastructure needed for the next 10 years of computing."

Henry comes with experience working in new technology groups at companies including Nvidia, where he was general manager for the company's GeForce GPU business. At SanDisk, Henry played a pivotal role as senior vice president and general manager of the Client Platform Solutions Business in developing the company's connected car, home and IoT business.

Most recently, Henry was CEO of Acetti Software, a startup focused on helping companies boost their cloud performance and cut infrastructure costs by taking advantage of multi-core server CPUs.

Seann Gardiner

Machine-learning technologies startup DataRobot hired Seann Gardiner, who previously held channel roles at Alteryx and Dell Software, to oversee and expand the startup's partner program. Gardiner serves as executive vice president of business development at DataRobot.

Gardiner comes to DataRobot with a background of working on channel initiatives with a number of up-and-coming companies. He most recently served as senior vice president for business development at data analytics firm Alteryx, overseeing channel partnerships for the company, which he had joined in 2013.

Before that, Gardiner worked as senior director of business development at systems management appliances firm KACE starting in 2007, and then stayed on with Dell Software for three years after the company's acquisition of KACE in 2010. At Dell Software, he focused on the channel in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region. Earlier, Gardiner served as director of business development and alliances at cybersecurity firm Sophos.

Mark Thurmond

Hybrid cloud management platform vendor Turbonomic has brought on a well-known IT industry executive, Mark Thurmond, as its first chief operating officer.

In the COO role, Thurmond will oversee Turbonomic's global partner and strategic alliances, sales and enablement, and marketing operations.

Between 2008 and mid-2015, Thurmond worked for two EMC business units, first as senior vice president of worldwide sales at RSA and then as senior vice president of global sales at VCE. He comes to Turbonomic after a two-year stint as executive vice president of worldwide sales and service at business intelligence software firm Qlik.

Kurt Lee

Security startup Pwnie Express announced that executive Kurt Lee, its vice president of sales and strategic accounts, will lead the company's new Stampede partner program.

It will be the first partner program for Pwnie Express to help facilitate sales through targeted regional reseller partners and MSSPs, Lee told CRN.

Lee started with Pwnie Express in April. Before that, he had most recently served as vice president of strategic alliances for RiskAnalytics, formerly the Netwitness portfolio under RSA, before its acquisition by Dell. He has also held a variety of sales and channel leadership roles at Q1Labs, ArcSight, Riptech, and Raptor Systems.

Dave DeWalt

Optiv Security added two prominent security advisers to its board of directors in September.

The Denver-based security solution provider said former FireEye and McAfee CEO Dave DeWalt had joined the company as vice chairman. The company also announced the addition of retired U.S. Army General David Petraeus to the board.

In a statement about the appointments, Optiv CEO Dan Burns said DeWalt and Petraeus add a new type of expertise to the board of directors. He said DeWalt brings a long technology background, including sitting as CEO of two major security companies and now sitting on boards of directors of many up-and-coming startups, while Petraeus brings expertise around global threat intelligence and the public sector.

Cory Reutzel

ScanSource-owned master agent Intelisys has named Cory Reutzel as senior manager of strategic partner development, Southwest Region. Reutzel, a former regional channel manager for Peak 10 + ViaWest, will be helping Intelisys and ScanSource partners grasp more cloud opportunities, according to Intelisys.

Based in Houston, Reutzel will be supporting sales partners across Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas and will report to Eddie Acosta, director of partner sales, Southwest Region for Intelisys.

Reutzel is a 15-year veteran in the IT services industry. Before his role with Peak 10 + ViaWest, Reutzel held senior channel leadership roles with service providers Birch and Windstream.

Mike Crest

In September, Mike Crest departed as CEO of data backup and recovery firm Arcserve to become chief executive of IT service management vendor Optanix.

At Arcserve, Crest had been CEO since the company was spun out of CA Technologies in 2014. Arcserve chairman Dave Hansen will take over as interim CEO, and the company said it's looking for a permanent replacement.

Before joining Arcserve, Crest spent 14 years in executive positions at CA.

At Optanix, Crest succeeds Mike Barry, operating partner at private equity firm Francisco Partners, which backs Optanix. Barry had been serving as CEO at Optanix since February.

Joti Balani

Digital transformation specialist Anexinet has hired Joti Balani as its new vice president of marketing.

The Blue Bell, Pa.-based company announced the hire in September as part of a push to put more resources behind its marketing team, which the company hopes will fuel expansion into new vertical industries and geographies.

Balani will lead Anexinet's efforts in marketing. Her experience has included roles in marketing, product development, and software engineering. She most recently was head of product for telecom service provider Cross River Fiber and, before that, spent three years as vice president of marketing at Lumos Networks.

Jason Albuquerque

Solution provider Carousel Industries had promoted company executive Jason Albuquerque to be its first chief information security officer.

Albuquerque had been serving as Carousel's director of business systems and operations since 2014. He will report to Executive Vice President of Operations Bill Thompson.

Albuquerque will be responsible for establishing a Security Office at Exeter, R.I.-based Carousel and spearheading defense against security threats to the company's services and infrastructure.

Dan Brown

Cloud ERP provider FinancialForce said it had hired longtime Microsoft executive Daniel Brown to serve in the newly created role of chief product officer, with responsibilities over the company's product strategy.

Previously, Brown spent 15 years at Microsoft, including as general manager of corporate strategy. The role involved oversight of Microsoft's internal strategy for digital transformation. Before that, Brown headed the product teams for Dynamic AX and Dynamics NAV at Microsoft.

Rahul Kanwar

Solution provider SS&C Technologies promoted Rahul Kanwar, a 12-year veteran of the company, to serve in an expanded role as executive vice president.

Windsor, Conn.-based SS&C said that Kanwar will remain focused on the company's fund administration business, and will report to President and Chief Operating Officer Norm Boulanger and to CEO Bill Stone.

Previously, Kanwar served as the managing director of Eisnerfast at Eisner LLP. He came to SS&C in 2005 with the company's acquisition of Eisnerfast.