Kaseya Makes Key Cloud-Focused Executive Moves After Big Year

Kaseya revealed Tuesday morning that it has made two executive moves focused on its cloud business.

The cloud-based IT management company, based in Boston, is promoting its vice president of technology programs, Mike Puglia, to chief information officer, and hiring Brian Serino as vice president of worldwide sales. Both moves were made as the two boast strong backgrounds in cloud technology.

"Both of these guys are a great fit, and I’m very happy that they are both on the team," Yogesh Gupta, president and CEO of Kaseya, told CRN by phone. "Having somebody who can drive growth with a cloud-first offering company, [who] knows how to sell it and knows how to get customers to understand the value of what we’re offering, and therefore, make strong progress there, I think makes [Serino] a really great fit for us.

Related: [Kaseya Adds Mobility Management; Updates Cloud Infrastructure]

"[Puglia] comes from a very strong technology background, but also comes from a marketing background as well, and he has a tremendous amount of experience with cloud," Gupta continued. "He worked at three cloud companies in a row, has a strong technical background, and he understands what a CIO needs to do in terms of building the right systems at Kaseya so Kaseya can grow."

Serino was senior vice president of sales and business development at NetProspex, where his team was credited with doubling the company’s sales numbers, according to Kaseya. He did the same when he served as senior vice president of sales at Neolane before joining NetProspex. Before that, he ran North American Sales at Unica, where his sales team grew revenue from $10 million to $120 million before the company was acquired by IBM, Kaseya said.

Puglia has worked with enterprise technology for more than 20 years and has cloud-based solutions experience working with Salesforce.com and Veracode, among others, Kaseya said.

The executive changes come on the heels of Kaseya’s year of big growth. The company says almost 70 percent of its new customers purchased its cloud offering last year. In addition to boosting its cloud subscriptions by over 40 percent, Kaseya saw its channel business globally grow almost 40 percent year over year, according to the company.

"That is really a wonderful thing for Kaseya," Gupta told CRN. "We are really trying our best to work well with the channel. We very much recognize the value channel partners bring to Kaseya as we stay focused on growing our business."

Just last month, Kaseya was listed on CRN’s 2015 Partner Programs Guide: 5-Star Software Vendors and continues to grow its channel presence.

"Kaseya helps us to 'do IT right,' " said Julie Chapman, president of 501cTech, a Washington, D.C.-based Kaseya partner, in a statement. "We first chose Kaseya because their offering and roadmap were the best match for our organization. Since then, Kaseya has continued to strengthen its core offering and has invested in new capabilities that enable us to keep pace with our customers' changing needs. As a result, we've been able to grow along with them."

PUBLISHED APRIL 7, 2015