30 Notable IT Executive Moves: October 2021

October saw new CEOs at FireEye-McAfee Enterprise, Logically, Ivanti and Citrix. Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and SAP all make new executive hires as well.

Virtualization and cloud computing company Citrix, security company McAfee Enterprise and FireEye and managed service provider Logically all saw new C-suite hires during October.

Google Cloud, Amazon Web Services and SAP were among other tech giants to make executive hires during the month as companies invest in resources for sales, technology and partners.

What follows are 30 notable IT executive moves from October 2021.

[RELATED: 30 Notable IT Executive Moves: September 2021]

Jessica Couto

Imperva hired longtime cybersecurity channel leader Jessica Couto in October to drive more services and enablement for the company’s North American solution provider partners.

The San Mateo, Calif.-based data security vendor tapped Couto to execute Imperva’s recently adopted strategy of transacting all net-new opportunities through channel partners. She reports to global channel chief Micheal McCollough, who joined from Akamai in March of this year.

Couto spent more than two years leading Americas channels for threat detection and response vendor Vectra.

Prior to her work at Vectra, Couto worked at Jask, where she was “responsible for growing top-of-the-funnel pipeline by more than one-third of the industry-standard 3X pipeline to hit target numbers” and designed “a new partner program for both Resellers and MSSPs to enable JASK to provide for generous GP to the channel, which results in swift channel recruitment,” according to her LinkedIn account.

Sumo Logic bought Austin, Texas-based cybersecurity intelligence vendor Jask Labs for $55.1 million in October 2019.

Southard Jones

In October, Salesforce hired Southard Jones as its chief operating officer of next-generation customer relationship management and unified data services, according to Jones’ LinkedIn account.

Before joining San Francisco-based Salesforce, Jones worked at Celonis for almost three years, leaving with the title of vice president of product marketing, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Jones worked at Domino Data Lab for more than a year, leaving in 2019 with the title of vice president of marketing, according to his LinkedIn bio. He was an “executive team member responsible for building the marketing team and creating a category for code-first data science platforms” and “led teams that drove Domino to be named the Leader in Forrester Wave for Machine Learning and tripled inbound pipeline generation.”

Prior to Domino, Jones worked as vice president of product strategy and marketing at Birst. He worked at Birst for more than four years until its acquisition by Infor in 2017. At Birst, he “built and mentored teams that led product strategy, positioning, and technology partnerships to grow ARR at 55 percent CAGR during tenure,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Bryan Palma

Bryan Palma officially became CEO of the combined $2 billion FireEye-McAfee Enterprise organization in October after private equity firm Symphony Technology Group (STG) closed its $1.2 billion acquisition of FireEye.

Palma joined Milpitas, Calif.-based FireEye in February as executive vice president of products. He previously served as BlackBerry’s president and chief operating officer for less than a year, according to his LinkedIn account. At BlackBerry, he “led the engineering, sales, marketing and services teams across BlackBerry’s UEM, QNX, AtHoc and Secusmart business units.”

He previously worked at Cisco for about six years, leaving in 2019 with the title of senior vice president and general manager of Americas’ customer experience, according to his LinkedIn bio. In this role, he was “responsible for Cisco’s $8B subscription software, customer success, and services across a team of engineers, developers, consultants, and customer success specialists.”

Diego Pantoja-Navajas

In October, Diego Pantoja-Navajas joined Amazon Web Services as vice president of new products for its business applications division, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Seattle-based AWS hired Pantoja-Navajas from Oracle. He joined Oracle in 2016 after the tech giant bought the LogFire company Pantoja-Navajas founded, according to his LinkedIn bio. Oracle rebranded LogFire as Oracle Fusion Cloud Warehouse Management. Pantoja-Navajas’ title when he left Oracle was vice president of WMS cloud development.

Pantoja-Navajas founded LogFire in 2007 to help “organizations of all sizes leverage the cloud to modernize their supply chain execution, boost fill rates and rise above competitors,” according to his LinkedIn bio. Prior to founding his startup, he worked for about a year at Aldata Solution implementing “inventory replenishment and warehouse management solutions at grocery and specialty retailers across the US.”

Wendy Gallery

Barcodes hired Wendy Gallery in October as vice president of account development and support, according to her account on LinkedIn.

Barcodes, based in Chicago, provides barcodes, mobile computing, point-of-sale and RFID products and services.

Gallery previously worked at VelocityEHS for more than two years, leaving with the title of enterprise sales director, according to her LinkedIn bio. While at VelocityEHS, she collaborated “with the leadership team focusing on enterprisewide sales initiatives, sales execution including marketing plans, sales partnerships, as well as project management while streamlining strategic initiatives and communicating objectives between departments.”

Before VelocityEHS, she worked for more than a year at LinkedIn, leaving in 2018 with the title of large enterprise relationship manager, according to her LinkedIn bio.
Prior to LinkedIn, Gallery worked for more than 13 years at Cars.com. She left in 2017 with the title of vice president of customer success, according to her LinkedIn account. While at Cars.com, she led a “sales team through various lead development processes, including inside, channel and referral channels.”

Gallery’s colleague Raul Cepeda--Barcodes’ vice president of product management and strategic alliances--was named a member of CRN’s 2021 Next-Gen Solution Provider Leaders.

Marty Bauerlein

In October, AMD hired former Tech Data executive Marty Bauerlein to lead the chipmaker’s North American value-added reseller business in a bid to dial up the competition against Intel and other rivals in the enterprise, midmarket and SMB segments.

As head of North America commercial VARs for the Santa Clara, Calif.-based chipmaker, Bauerlein reports to Terry Richardson, the Hewlett Packard Enterprise veteran who was hired as AMD’s North America channel chief in March.

Bauerlein previously spent 16 years at IT distributor Tech Data, which merged with Synnex in September to become the industry’s largest IT distribution company. Before his departure in May, he was senior vice president of North American sales for more than three years. Prior to his time at Tech Data, he spent 12 years at another major IT distributor, Ingram Micro.

Daniel Perlick

Kyndryl, the spin-off of IBM’s managed infrastructure services business, hired Daniel Perlick in October as its vice president and global practice leader for digital workplace services, according to his LinkedIn.

Perlick worked at IBM for more than 28 years, according to his LinkedIn bio. He left in 2018 as vice president of infrastructure services for its Global Technology Services segment, the precursor to Kyndryl.

Perlick joined New York-based Kyndryl after less than a year with Lakeside Software, where he served as director of global alliances.

Prior to Lakeside, Perlick worked at Digital Management for more than two years. He left in 2020 with the title of business unit president of connected solutions and cloud services.

Dino DiMarino

Dino DiMarino joined cybersecurity company Snyk in October as chief revenue officer, according to his LinkedIn.

He’ll focus on global expansion, building out go-to-market initiatives, and strengthening capabilities in the financial services and federal government verticals.

He previously held the title at Mimecast, where he worked for more than five years. He spent more than seven years at RSA in regional and global sales leadership roles, leaving in 2016 with the title of vice president of the Americas.

DiMarino joins following a $530 million Series F round of investment into Boston-based Snyk, which made it the second-most-valuable venture-backed cybersecurity company in the world.

Arpan Shah

SAP hired former Microsoft Azure marketing executive Arpan Shah last month as the company’s new senior vice president of product management for SAP S/4 HANA Cloud, the company’s flagship cloud ERP application suite.

Before joining Germany-based SAP, Shah departed Microsoft after more than 20 years at the company, including nearly six years leading product marketing for Azure infrastructure.

He reports to Jan Gilg, president of SAP S/4HANA. At Microsoft Shah led product marketing for Azure infrastructure starting in January 2012, overseeing marketing for Azure IaaS, Azure Stack, Azure ARC and other products.

Shah led core product marketing efforts for Office 365 before taking on the Azure duties. Prior to that, he held various product management posts for Microsoft Project and SharePoint.

Tajasvi Devaru

In October, Tejasvi Devaru joined Automation Anywhere as vice president of IT strategy and program management, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Devaru joined the San Jose, Calif.-based company after about four years with IBM. He left IBM with the title of associate partner in the enterprise strategy group of IBM Global Business Services, which is now known as IBM Consulting.

During his time with IBM, he “transformed (a) 700+ strong IT organization to work in new Agile way, with the IRR of 28% on a program investment,” which resulted in “savings of $1M+ every year,” according to his LinkedI bio. He also “Identified 350M+ revenue and costs savings through digital transformation for a leading nuclear reactor and fuel manufacturer” and “identified 250M+ in incremental revenue opportunity through monetizing first party data for a leading provider of technology systems and services for transportation and defense markets worldwide.”

Prior to IBM, Devaru worked at PwC for more than eight years. He left the consulting firm in 2017 with the title of director of digital marketing and commerce, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Manish Sampat

Manish Sampat rejoined Palo Alto Networks in October with the title of vice president of engineering, according to his LinkedIn account.

He left Santa Clara, Calif.-based Palo Alto Networks in 2018 after more than six years with the company. He left with the title of vice president of engineering, management software and cloud services.

After Sampat left Palo Alto Networks, he worked at Apstra for about a year. Juniper Networks bought Apstra earlier this year. He joined Tigera In 2019 and worked for the provider of open-source Kubernetes cloud service Calico for more than two years, leaving with the title of vice president of engineering.

Prior to his first stint with Palo Alto Networks, Sampat worked at Clearwell Systems for more than five years, leaving in 2011 as director of engineering.

Michelle Accardi

Michelle Accardi became CEO of Logically in October, according to a company statement. She succeeds Mike Cowles. In January, Accardi had joined the board of Logically--a member of CRN’s 2021 Tech Elite 250.

Before joining the Portland, Maine.-based MSP, she worked at Star2Star Communications for more than eight years, most recently in the role of president and chief revenue officer.

Accardi led Star2Star through its acquisition by Sangoma Technologies Corp. in January for about $437 million, according to a company statement from the time. Sangoma is a Canadian, publicly traded, cloud-based Communications-as-a-Service solution provider.

Before Star2Star, Accardi worked at CA Technologies for more than 10 years. She left in 2013 with the title of vice president of digital transformation.

Earlier this year, Accardi was honored as part of CRN’s 2021 Women of the Channel Awards.

Robert Purcell

Data integration services provider Talend hired Robert Purcell as chief financial officer in October, according to his LinkedIn account.

He has more than 25 years of experience in executive financial roles, according to a statement by Redwood City, Calif.-based Talend.

Purcell previously served as CFO at Paysafe, leaving in 2020 after more than two years with the financial software company. He joined Paysafe through the $1 billion acquisition of iPayment in 2018, where he served as CFO at the time. He had joined iPayment in 2012.

Prior to iPayment, he worked in leadership roles at Intuit, Amgen and Deloitte, according to his LinkedIn.

Earlier this year, private equity firm Thoma Bravo announced a deal to buy Talend for $2.4 billion.

Bob Calderoni

Bob Calderoni, chairman of Citrix’s board of directors, was appointed interim president and CEO in October when David Henshall stepped down.

Calderoni has served on Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Citrix’s board of directors since June 2014, according to the company’s website. He previously held the interim CEO and president role at Citrix from October 2015 to January 2016, replacing former CEO Mark Templeton.

He served as CEO of Ariba from 2001 to 2014, leading the company through its acquisition by SAP in 2012 for $4.3 billion. He was a member of SAP’s global managing board from 2012 to 2014 and president of SAP Cloud from 2013 to 2014.

“I am pleased to be taking on the role of interim CEO and excited to work with the Board, talented management team, and dedicated Citrix employees during such an important time for the company,” he said in a statement from the time. “We remain focused on transitioning the business to SaaS as we work to securely deliver a unified work experience for our valued customers. I look forward to leading the company into its next phase of growth and success, and I am confident that this will be a smooth leadership transition.”

Mor Ben-Asher

Last month, Mor Ben-Asher returned to Intel, taking the title of vice president of hardware development, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Before joining Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel, he left Amazon Web Services after more than a year at the cloud giant. He left with the title of head of ASIC, machine learning acceleration, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Ben-Asher previously worked at Intel for six years, leaving in 2003 with the title of director of engineering, according to his LinkedIn account.

More recently, he worked at Cisco for more than two years, leaving in 2020 with the title of vice president of engineering for the ASIC data center group for Cisco’s Insieme Business Unit (INSBU).

Prior to Cisco, Ben-Asher worked at Barefoot Networks as head of ASIC. He left in 2017 after more than three years with the company, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Fred Scherman

In October, Kodak Alaris hired Fred Scherman as Americas channel sales director, according to a company statement. His role is to expand partnerships with value-added resellers, distributors, independent software vendors and systems integrators.

Scherman joins England-based Kodak Alaris after 10-plus years with Panasonic, according to his LinkedIn bio. His final role with Panasonic was national sales manager, where he “developed annual and long term objectives with respect to profit volume and market penetration” and “conducted quarterly reviews with Channel/Distribution Partners to review strategic plans against performance.”

Prior to Panasonic, he worked for about a year at Monfort Electronics Marketing as a manufacturer’s representative for Panasonic’s office line of interactive whiteboards, scanners and faces. He left Monfort in 2011, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Philippe Vincent

The new chief operating officer at IT operations management platform provider OpsRamp is Philippe Vincent, according to his LinkedIn account.

Vincent joined San Jose, Calif.-based OpsRamp last month after doing consulting work for more than a year. He served as CEO of Virtana, an IT operations automation company for hybrid cloud, for more than four years, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Before Virtana, he was CEO of infrastructure performance validation Load DynamiX for more than four years, according to his LinkedIn bio. He left Load DynamiX in 2016.

His resume includes serving as chief operating officer and head of strategy and business development for BigFix, according to his LinkedIn account. In 2010, IBM bought BigFix for about $400 million.

Vincent spent almost 10 years with Accenture, leaving in 2007 with the title of electronics and high tech strategy practice partner, according to LinkedIn.

Eric Herzog

Eric Herzog joined Infinidat in October as chief marketing officer, reporting to CEO Phil Bullinger, according to a company statement.

He leads the Waltham, Mass.-based company’s global marketing, brand strategy and execution, according to the statement. His responsibilities in this role span product marketing, go-to-market strategies, brand-building, marketing programs, strategic communications, competitive analysis, and strengthening relationships with industry influencers and stakeholders.

Herzog has more than 30 years of experience in enterprise storage. He previously worked at IBM for more than six years, leaving with the title of CMO and vice president of global storage channels at IBM Storage Solutions, according to his LinkedIn bio.

He also worked for about a year at all-flash storage provider Violin Memory, leaving in 2015 with the title of CMO and senior vice president of alliances, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Leon Platts

IBM hired Leon Platts last month as its vice president of major deals business development for IBM Cloud, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Platts joined Armonk, N.Y.-based IBM after more than six years with Verizon Business, according to his LinkedIn bio. His most recent title with Verizon was managing director of Verizon global integration solutions. His team was “responsible for capturing, developing and contracting large, integrated IT infrastructure and Network-As-A-Service projects for Verizon’s Business Customers,” with contracts ranging from $250 million to more than $300 million.

Prior to Verizon, Platts worked at BT for more than 14 years, according to his LinkedIn bio. He left in 2015 as head of the U.S. for major deals and development for the global finance market. During his time with BT, Platts served as “pursuit lead for $100M plus deals within the Global Finance Market,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Rocco Lavista

Rocco Lavista returned to Hewlett Packard Enterprise last month, taking on the title of vice president of worldwide sales and go-to-market leader for HPE GreenLake, according to his LinkedIn account.

Lavista previously worked at Spring, Texas-based HPE for more than 10 years, leaving in 2016 with the title of senior sales director. During this time, his responsibilities included “managing direct teams to focus on high performance sales with a go-to market strategy encompassing alliances and channel partners for Enterprise Data Management solutions,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Before this new stint at HPE, Lavista worked for more than two years at Dell, leaving with the title of transformational sales leader, according to his LinkedIn bio. His responsibilities included “managing strategic sales pursuits and teams across various Dell Technologies business units (Dell/EMC, VMware, Tanzu (Pivotal), RSA, SecureWorks, Virtustream, and Boomi) focused on driving transformational solutions for Global and Enterprise customers that deliver results against their highest priority business objectives.”

Prior to Dell, Lavista worked at Microsoft for about a year, leaving in 2018 with the title of senior sales director, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Frank Weigel

Frank Weigel joined Google Cloud last month as vice president of the company’s business application platform, according to his LinkedIn account.

He comes to Mountain View, Calif.-based Google after more than seven years with Microsoft. He left Microsoft with the title of vice president of Dynamics 365 Insights Apps. In this role, he was “responsible for Microsoft‘s CDP offering, Dynamics 365 Customer Insights, and Power Query data prep,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Prior to Microsoft, Weigel worked at Couchbase for more than three years. He left the NoSQL database technology provider in 2013 with the title of vice president of products, according to his LinkedIn bio. During his time with the company he was “responsible for definition, positioning and release of Couchbase Server 2.0” and “created and ran a world-wide evangelist team, in order to better engage and grow the user community,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Robert Statsky

In October, cybersecurity company Huntress hired Robert Statsky as vice president of partner and customer success, according to his account on LinkedIn.

Ellicott City, Md.-based Huntress hired Statsky from phone company Aircall, where he worked for more than two years, according to his LinkedIn bio. He left the company with the title of customer success director. During his time at Aircall, Statsky “managed all revenue functions post-sale in North America: Customer Success and Customer Onboarding,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Prior to Aircall, he worked at review platform Trustpilot in the role of customer success director. He worked at the company for two-plus years, leaving in 2016. During his time at Aircall, Statsky “managed 4 revenue-driven teams of Customer Success Managers educating clients on the value of third party customer feedback” and “managed the Customer On-boarding/Implementation team as well,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Jay Hegler

Oracle hired Jay Hegler in October as its chief business officer of North America cloud and technology, according to his LinkedIn bio.

“Winning in the cloud is not a foregone conclusion,” he wrote on LinkedIn. “There is so much opportunity still up for grabs. Oracle has an awesome combination of a massive customer base, seasoned industry experience, assets galore that go up and down the tech stack and industry apps that are prime for acceleration yet the company still has a great deal of untapped potential in the world of cloud. I like Oracle’s chances of winning a supersized amount of cloud workload and can’t wait to roll up my sleeves and get to work.”

Before joining Austin, Texas-based Oracle, Hegler worked at Domo for about five years, leaving with the title of chief business officer, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Prior to Domo, he worked at Amazon Web Services for more than five years, leaving in 2016 with the title of U.S. enterprise sales lead, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Hegler also worked at Microsoft for more than 10 years, leaving in 2011 with the title of director of enterprise solutions.

Randy Turer

Randy Turer joined cybersecurity company Critical Start last month as vice president of managed detection and response sales, according to his LinkedIn account.

Turer has experience in “providing Hardware and Software, SaaS/Cloud solutions including Endpoint Security, Network, Messaging, Web, Firewall, and Encryption solutions,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Before joining Plano, Texas-based Critical Start, he was at Absolute Software, where his last role was vice president of North America sales.

Prior to Absolute, Turer worked at ForeScout Technologies for about two years. He left in 2017 with the title of director of sales, according to his LinkedIn account.

His resume includes time spent as a senior director of sales for the U.S., Canada and Latin America at Symantec, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Ryan Grant

Last month, ESET hired longtime Ingram Micro executive Ryan Grant to push upmarket and enhance the company’s strategy for different solution provider segments.

The Bratislava, Slovakia-based cybersecurity vendor tasked Grant with expanding ESET’s customer base beyond businesses with fewer than 2,500 seats to include enterprise businesses with more than 2,500 users. Grant also plans to focus on developing coverage and marketing models that provide a differentiated experience for solution providers based on if they’re a VAR, MSP or systems integrator.

As ESET’s vice president of sales for the U.S., Grant will spend “a disproportionate amount of time” getting the company’s channel to the next level. He will report to ESET North America President and fellow former Ingram Micro executive Brent McCarty. Grant spent the past nine years leading Ingram Micro’s 100-person, $2 billion VMware, Dell and integrated solutions business.

Garrett Jones

Cybersecurity company Datto hired Garrett Jones last month as its vice president of sales for the Americas West region, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Jones joined Norwalk, Conn.-based Datto from IronNet Cybersecurity, where he worked for more than two years. He left IronNet with the title of vice president of strategy and business transformation. During his time at IronNet, Jones was responsible for “the global channel organization, primarily focused on delivering SaaS offerings through GSIs & GSPs, strategic business development via the ISACs and pipeline creation via an SDR function,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Prior to IronNet, Jones worked for more than two years at Forcepoint. He left the company in 2019 with the title of vice president of sales for global midmarket and customer success.

His resume includes stints as NSS Labs’ chief revenue officer, vice president of global channels at Symantec and global alliance manager at Dell, where he “managed Dell‘s strategic partnership with Symantec and SAP,” according to his account on LinkedIn.

Vigyan Singhal

Last month, Nvidia bought formal verification methods company Oski Technology and made its founder and chairman, Vigyan Singhal, vice president of hardware engineering, according to Singhal’s LinkedIn account.

“Today, verification engineers rely on two very different methods to make sure bugs don’t make it into silicon—simulation and formal verification,” according to a statement in October from Santa Clara, Calif.-based Nvidia.

“Formal verification, Oski’s specialty, is a powerful alternative that uses mathematical analysis of a design instead of simulations to prove that a particular feature behaves correctly for all possible inputs,” the statement continues.

Singhal founded Oski in 2005 and has authored more than 70 publications and holds 14 patents in IC design and verification, according to Oski’s website. He has worked in the semiconductor and EDA industries for more than 25 years.

He previously founded formal analysis provider Jasper Design Automation, which was bought by Cadence Design Systems in 2014. Singhal had left Jasper in 2005.

Jeff Abbott

Automation platform provider Ivanti promoted second-in-command Jeff Abbott to CEO in October.

The South Jordan, Utah-based company credited Abbott with helping to more than double the company’s revenue to more than $1 billion during his 18 months as president. In that role, he oversaw product development, product management, marketing, global sales, customer experience and operations.

Abbott took over for Jim Schaper, who, like Abbott, joined Ivanti at the start of 2020 from Infor. Abbott worked at Infor for about 11 years, leaving with the title of executive vice president.

Prior to Infor, Abbott worked at Oracle for about eight years, leaving in 2008 with the title of group vice president, according to his LinkedIn account.

Chris Raniere

Chris Raniere joined cybersecurity company Open Systems last month as chief revenue officer.

Before joining Switzerland-based Open Systems, he left Secureworks after five-plus years, leaving with the title of regional vice president of sales for North America. At SecureWorks, he “consistently achieved double-digit sales growth of the company’s MDR and network security services year over year,” according to Open Systems’ website.

Prior to Secureworks, Raniere worked for more than eight years at Cbeyond. He left the company with the title of vice president and general manager of sales. Birch Communications bought Cbeyond in 2014 for $323 million.

Jason Eberhardt

Proofpoint hired Jason Eberhardt in October as its global vice president of cloud and MSP, according to his LinkedIn account.

Prior to joining Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Proofpoint, Eberhardt worked at Bitdefender for more than two years, leaving with the same title he holds at Proofpoint, according to his LinkedIn bio.

While at Bitdefender, he was “responsible for helping grow the Cloud & MSP globally through Bitdefender Cloud & MSP solutions” and owned “the Global Cloud & MSP team that is comprised of Inside sales, MSP account executives, MSP SE organization, and Distribution,” according to his LinkedIn bio.

Eberhardt is also co-chair of CompTIA’s business applications advisory council, according to the group’s website.

Before Bitdefender, he worked for more than a year at Symantec, leaving in 2019 with the title of North America cloud channel leader, according to his LinkedIn bio.

He joined Symantec from partner company Conventus Corp. He left Conventus in 2017 after more than two years with the company, leaving with the title of vice president of strategic alliances and channel sales, according to his LinkedIn bio.

Earlier this year, private equity giant Thoma Bravo agreed to purchase email security powerhouse Proofpoint for $12.3 billion in the biggest cybersecurity acquisition of all time.