Nutanix Chief Revenue Officer Leaves Days After Stock Drops

One week after Nutanix’s stock plummeted 32 percent due to a weak third fiscal quarter guidance, the company’s chief revenue officer, Louis Attanasio, has left the hyper-converged pioneer.

On March 6, just days after the hyper-converged infrastructure leader reported a lower-than-expected sales guidance for its current third quarter, Attanasio notified Nutanix that he will be leaving “to pursue other opportunities,” according to an 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Attanasio’s last day at Nutanix was March 7, according to the filing.

Attanasio was responsible for leading Nutanix’s global sales efforts, which include field and technical sales, inside sales, channel and OEM sales, as well as professional services, according to Nutanix’s website.

[Related: Dheeraj Pandey On Nutanix Stock Price Fall: ‘Naysayers Are Best Ignored’]

Nutanix did not respond by press time for comment. No replacement for Attanasio was named in the March 6 SEC filing.

“The company thanks Mr. Attanasio for his service to the company,” said Nutanix in the SEC filing.

Attanasio joined Nutanix in November 2017. Prior to Nutanix, Attanasio was executive vice president and CRO at Informatica, a Redwood City, Calif.-based enterprise cloud data management company. Attanasio has over 35 years of technology and sales leadership experience including a 16-year tenure at IBM.

His departure comes as the San Jose, Calif.-based company faces questions from investors after its market cap quickly dropped from roughly $9 billion to $6 billion on March 1. On Feb. 28, Nutanix reported solid sales of $335 million for its second fiscal quarter. However, the company provided third-quarter revenue guidance of between $290 million and $300 million, with analysts expecting revenues to be around $348 million.

In an interview with CRN, Nutanix CEO Dheeraj Pandey said the weak guidance was due to a slower than expected sales hiring and not enough investment on lead generation. Pandey told CRN that he was still bullish on his company’s growth and innovation strategy.

“Setbacks are temporary. Naysayers are best ignored,” said Pandey. “If you build something bold and audacious, you got to fall. But once you fall, how do you rise to the occasion and how do you learn from those mistakes is what builds great companies.”

Nutanix stock closed up 3.28 percent on Monday afternoon to $35.63 per share, with a total market cap of $6.38 billion.