Top 50 Midmarket IT Vendor Executives For 2014

Paving The Way: This Year's Top 50 Midmarket Vendor Executives

This annual list, produced by The Channel Company's Midsize Enterprise Summit, highlights the IT industry's most influential vendor executives who focus on the midmarket, one of the IT industry's fastest-growing markets. Many of the executives featured here are not only responsible for their company's midmarket customer segment, but also the go-to-market route to the customer -- the channel. These executives were nominated by peers, colleagues, customers and partners because of the strong relationships they have built with midmarket customers, and for their leadership, strategic thinking and solution excellence they demonstrate. Many of the executives included on this list will be attending the Midsize Enterprise Summit West conference in Dallas this week, where they will be recognized for their achievements.

8x8 Inc., Don Trimble, Vice President of Channel Sales

Trimble is responsible for the development and management of all aspects of 8x8's third-party channel operations. Trimble brings more than 25 years of experience to 8x8, achieving revenue, profit and business growth objectives for some of the largest IT companies in the world. He has been dedicated to the midmarket for the past five years at 8x8, which focuses on removing the complexity of managing BYOD devices by providing a business phone service that is platform-agnostic. 8x8's Virtual Office and Virtual Contact center cloud services help midmarket businesses to compete, save money and expand.

Acronis, Serguei Beloussov, CEO and Co-Founder

Beloussov, who is described by his colleagues as being "crazy about data," is an entrepreneur and investor with more than 20 years of experience building, growing and leading high-performing, global tech companies focused on midmarket needs. Beloussov has co-founded more than 20 international technology companies, accumulating hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue, including Acronis, which produces new-generation data protection solutions with 300,000 midmarket customers. Using dedicated modules developed for Windows Server and Linux, Acronis Backup accesses and backs up any type of data using its block-level, image-based backup technology to lower training and IT costs.

Acumatica, Jon Roskill, CEO

Roskill has 25 years of leadership experience in the software business, including a 20-year career at Microsoft, where he held positions as channel chief and corporate vice president, running the Worldwide Partner Group. Joining Acumatica in March 2014, Roskill plans to continue the company's growth in the midmarket. Acumatica, a cloud-based enterprise resource planning and business management solutions provider, was created for small and midsize businesses. It recently introduced its new platform, which enables companies to reduce the time and cost it takes to create Software-as-a-Service applications. Roskill began his career as a programmer and is also an active startup investor and popular public speaker.

Adaptive Insights, Carolee Gearhart, Vice President of International Sales and Global Channels

Gearhart is responsible for Adaptive Insights' sales organization outside of North America, as well as all business development for its more than 200 global channel partners. With nearly 12 years in senior executive partnership roles, including SAP and PeopleSoft, Gearhart is helping Adaptive accelerate global expansion. She has been focused on the midmarket for the past five years and believes that companies of all sizes should be able to realize the benefits of great SaaS solutions, specifically aiming to support the midmarket with Adaptive's cloud business intelligence and corporate performance management solutions.

AirWatch, Gavin Harris, Director of Global Sales Enablement and Operations

Harris has been with AirWatch for more than five years, helping it drive revenue, build processes and expand the North American commercial and government sales teams in the midmarket. AirWatch, an enterprise-grade mobile device management and mobile content management solution provider, focuses on the midmarket, serving hundreds of midsize companies. For 15 years, Harris has worked in the enterprise and wireless management arena, including commercial sales with Computer Associates and federal sales with Aruba Networks. Harris recognizes the unique opportunity for growth and development in the midmarket, and is dedicated to developing solutions to exceed expectations of what mobility can do.

Autotask Corporation, Len DiCostanzo, Senior Vice President of Community And Business Development

With more than 25 years experience in IT, DiCostanzo currently develops and nurtures Autotask's strategic industry alliances around the world. Autotask, which focuses on operational efficiency with its integrated service delivery and business management software, has built a multitenant SaaS platform that eliminates data silos, and DiCostanzo is on the forefront of the company's continued success in the midmarket. The desire by midmarket companies for excellence and growth fuels his passion to ensure Autotask's solutions, along with its community of industry experts, fully supports their efforts both now and in the future. DiCostanzo currently sits on CompTIA's MSP Partners Executive Council and the Vendor Advisory Council.

Axcient, Justin Moore, CEO and Co-Founder

Moore is an entrepreneur and a recognized authority on cloud computing, SMB market strategy and entrepreneurship. As the CEO and Founder of Axcient, Moore leads the transformation of the data backup and business continuity industry to eliminate data loss and application downtime for businesses. Axcient's local and cloud-based recovery technology, which was completely built in-house and doesn't use third-party licenses, provides enterprise-class functionality and power with the simplicity and price points that the midmarket requires. Prior to Axcient, Moore founded MK Global, where he secured exclusive rights to more than $1 billion in infrastructure from a major telecom provider.

Barracuda, Michael Hughes, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales

Hughes is responsible for the strategy, direction and execution of global sales and sales operations for Barracuda. Since entering this role in 2010, he has successfully grown revenue rapidly across multiple product lines. At Barracuda, Hughes is dedicated to making security and storage solutions that are easy to deploy, operate and support for the midmarket customer. His team is built of solution providers dedicated to meeting midmarket customer needs, and he is constantly working to grow and enable Barracuda's strategy to support this space. Prior to Barracuda, Hughes was the vice president of sales for Asempra Technologies, and sales and business development leader at McData.

Birst, Jay Larson, CEO

Larson is Birst's CEO and has more than 25 years of experience in the software industry. Prior to joining Birst, Larson worked at such organizations as Jive Software, SuccessFactors, Mercury Initiative, Oracle, Network Associates and Siebel Systems. Birst, a business intelligence platform engineered with an automated data warehouse and visual analytics, offers faster and less costly BI solutions catered to the needs of midmarket IT executives. Birst has seen strong adoption at the midmarket level, and Larson's successful leadership background propels the creation of midmarket-focused BI solutions that are less costly than legacy solutions but more powerful than lightweight data discovery tools.

Cisco, Sherri Liebo, Vice President of Global Partner Marketing

Liebo and her team drive engagement with Cisco's sales and marketing organizations to accelerate demand for Cisco technologies and services to midmarket customers through its partner community, which represents more than 80 percent of the company's $47 billion revenue. Liebo's 25 years of experience at Cisco and Hewlett-Packard have included a strong focus on the SMB and midmarket segments using the partner route to market as a strategic advantage. At Cisco, Liebo focuses on delivering innovative solutions that meet and exceed the needs of midsize businesses and truly understands the challenges that midmarket CIOs face.

Datto, Austin McChord, Founder and CEO

As the brainchild and chief architect behind one of the fastest-growing technology companies in the world, McChord has guided Datto to global expansion and the introduction of channel-leading and midmarket-focused solutions. These solutions not only move the industry forward, but also equip partners with the necessary tools to mitigate downtime for end users and build their businesses. As the preferred global provider of backup, disaster recovery and intelligent business continuity, Datto is redefining the future of the BDR market. Under McChord's guidance, Datto has been listed on the prestigious Inc. 500 list for the past three years in a row. McChord's dedication to midmarket companies has resulted in 8,000 global Datto partners.

Dell SecureWorks, Jeff Multz, Director of North American Midmarket Sales and Security Evangelist

Multz has been part of the IT industry for more than 25 years, and his mission is to educate the midmarket on the ever-evolving threat landscape and the importance of a comprehensive and proven information security program. Multz believes in entrepreneurship, and has built a successful midmarket business fueled by that passion. As a true advocate for the midmarket, he has led the midsize sales team at Dell SecureWorks for more than 10 years and was also included on this list last year. Dell SecureWorks, which offers information security, threat intelligence, and security and risk consulting services, carefully takes into account the unique needs of the midmarket.

D-Link Systems, Michael Hardy, Vice President of U.S. Enterprise and Channel Sales

Hardy has more than 22 years of computer industry sales management and corporate leadership experience within a wide range of vertical markets. Hardy believes that the midmarket is the backbone of America's business deliverables, and D-Link is uniquely suited to deliver high-performance products with the right pricing model for midmarket businesses. Hardy understands the business drivers behind the midmarket buying process. His goal since joining the D-Link team was to make the company an easy choice for channel partners to promote and work with. D-Link caters to the midmarket by offering lifetime warranties on most business-class products and reducing cost while minimizing risk to derive more from limited resources.

Eaton, Curtiz Gangi, Power Quality Director of U.S. Channels and Data Center Sales Organization

Gangi is a 22-year industry veteran in the power quality and technology business. He has held positions in hardware and software product management, business development and executive management. Eaton is committed to helping midmarket organizations drive profitable revenue as they drive into the cloud. Gangi is focused on educating the market on the impacts of power related to virtualization and other technologies being utilized in the data center. Gangi cited three fundamental reasons for the midmarket's importance: they validate and leverage best practices related to technology; they seek efficiency and scale related to solutions; and they look for long-term partners who can help expand their capabilities and competencies.

FalconStor Software, Gary Quinn, President and CEO

Quinn joined FalconStor in April 2012 with more than 20 years of technology experience with customers and partners. Most recently, Quinn was the CIO at Suffolk County Department of Information Technology, so he has firsthand knowledge of the needs of midmarket IT executives. Since becoming CEO of FalconStor, which offers data protection, management, migration and continuity, Quinn made strategic decisions to restore the company and re-establish a focus on the midmarket by better positioning the company for cloud service providers.

Fortinet, Bryan Wood, Vice President of U.S. Channel and Mid-Enterprise Sales

Wood brings more than 13 years of networking, network security and channel experience to his current role at Fortinet. In the last year, Wood has built a thriving midmarket enterprise sales team while growing revenue in the market by 37 percent. This growth can be attributed to Wood's vision of the company's value to midmarket customers, as well as his dedication to partnership via superior post-sales customer service. He understands the importance of pairing solutions that help bridge the gap between budget constraints and project requirements.

Gridstore, George Symons, CEO

Symons brings more than 20 years of storage experience to Gridstore as a member of its board of directors and CEO. He previously served as chief strategy officer at Nexsan, and held executive roles in several storage companies. Symons believes the midmarket is the most dynamic segment of today's economy because of the diverse opportunities in terms of rapid growth and expansion of existing vendors, openness to the introduction of innovative technologies and the ability to embrace early-adoption trends. Throughout his career in high-tech, Symons has established a reputation as a thoughtful, compassionate executive.

Halo Business Intelligence, Brandon Kirby, Vice President of Technology and Business Development

Kirby is a visionary champion of BI and analytics for midmarket companies. He focuses Halo BI on meeting the needs of midmarket CIOs by reducing project cost and risk with existing technologies, and simplifying BI using prebuilt integration to ERPs to preserve constrained midmarket budgets. For Kirby, the midmarket is where there is the flexibility to innovate, which is essential to U.S. competitiveness, and Halo BI is dedicated to providing a strong data integration and analytics platform that fits the midmarket price point. Midmarket companies like Taylor Farms, Citizens Bank and Pacific Southwest Container have all provided testimonials in 2014 about their satisfaction with Halo BI and Kirby's leadership.

Hewlett-Packard, Aaron Mills, Vice President of Americas Midsize Commercial/SMB and Inside Sales

Mills is an industry veteran and second-year Top 50 list honoree who has built a reputation of excellence in the midmarket space preceded by his passion for building long-lasting, personal relationships with his midmarket customers. With more than 122,000 customers, Mills' SMB team is responsible for proactively positioning the HP strategy and tactical execution across diverse industries and their associated IT/Business requirements within the midmarket. HP, and specifically Mills, has a firm grasp on the midmarket, building end-to-end solutions that consistently meet the server, storage, networking, software and services needs of the midmarket CIO. Mills' teams have consistently delivered strong revenue, margin and market share growth.

IBM, Amy Lewis, WW Performance Management, Risk Analytics and Midmarket Sales, Channels Executive, Business Analytics

Lewis, a second-year Top 50 honoree, has more than 15 years of leadership experience in consulting, business analytics and performance management enterprise software industries. She joined IBM through the Cognos acquisition in 2008, and has driven awareness and strategy for business analytics in the midmarket across the company. Lewis is focused on facilitating and stimulating worldwide midsize company growth with innovative analytics solutions that are packaged and priced for midmarket requirements and budgets. She is a key voice and face to the analyst community, and her passion and relationships with business partners in the midmarket create synergies for growth.

Igloo Software, Andrew Dixon, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Operations

Dixon is responsible for Igloo's sales operations and go-to-market strategy, including demand generation and communications. Prior to Igloo, he was an 18-year veteran of Microsoft, where he managed several product groups and divisions. Igloo was designed for, and sells first to, midmarket companies, and offers a cloud solution that brings content, file sharing and conversation together in one place. It provides an alternative to the legacy vendor relationships and the inevitable app mashup that comes with the consumerization of IT among midmarket organizations. Under Dixon's guidance, Igloo was recently awarded the Frost & Sullivan Best Practice Award for Enterprise Social Networking, recognizing outstanding achievement and performance.

Information Builders, Kevin Quinn, Vice President of Product Management

Quinn began his career at Information Builders more than 20 years ago and remains a distinguished industry veteran. He has a deep understanding of the BI marketplace and has been credited with helping define BI end-user categories through his creation of BI tool guidelines specifically for the midmarket. Quinn's efforts during his tenure at Information Builders, which offers BI, analytics, data integration and data quality solutions, have helped propel the company's WebFOCUS and iWay Software solutions to category leadership in their respective areas. Through Information Builders, Quinn has been able to work with midsize financial institutions, well-known retail brands and organizations with unique BI and analytics needs, such as Columbus Zoo & Aquarium in Ohio.

Intel, Michael Swain, Enterprise Group HP Sales Leader

Swain is responsible for developing and driving Intel's Enterprise Group "go to market" and revenue with HP. He is instrumental in working with HP on midmarket IT sales execution and alignment, and has supported and partnered closely with HP in executing a significant expansion of the midsize/SMB product road map and value proposition. HP and Intel have partnered to develop a broad array of compute, storage and networking solutions, specifically tailored to the unique challenges and opportunities facing midsize/SMB organizations. Given Swain's midmarket advocacy, and the breadth and scope of Intel's impact on the IT industry, his leadership and support for midmarket IT needs cannot be overstated.

IntelePeer, Michael Jerich, Chief Commercial Officer

Jerich has 15 years of industry experience and focuses on IntelePeer's companywide sales and business development organizations, sales engineering and post-sales support for the midmarket. He has a track record of driving sales with an ability to achieve revenue goals and high customer satisfaction levels within diverse industries, and is dedicated to meeting the demands of the midmarket. Jerich and his team really understand the midmarket cost-saving and efficiencies gained from moving to a SIP/IP network, so IntelePeer's CoreCloud SIP Trunking services combine the voice quality of HD audio with the protection of four-kilobit public key encryption to deliver just that.

Interneer, Romeo Elias, President, CEO and Founder

Elias is an experienced software executive, business process management expert, entrepreneur and patented inventor. He has overseen Interneer's growth from its founding in 2000 to an established software company with Fortune 1000 and hundreds of midmarket customers. Elias is an influential IT vendor executive with more than 15 years of experience, and has focused his career on providing technology solutions to midsize organizations. Interneer, a provider of BPM and Smart Mobile Apps, focuses on finding the best solution for the midmarket and adapting to its needs under Elias' leadership. He focuses on providing rapid ROI for midmarket customers, and enjoys helping the midmarket grow, expand and innovate.

Juniper Networks, David Helfer, Vice President of Worldwide Channels and Commercial

Helfer joined Juniper Networks in 2000 from UUNET and dedicates much of his time and research to midmarket companies. Juniper, which focuses on networks across the domains of routing, switching and security, invests in the midmarket through its more than 12,000 partners, enablement tools, product development and marketing development funds. Helfer and his team at Juniper offer solutions that virtualize networks that integrate with cloud orchestration systems to help midmarket firms gain better cloud efficiency and application deployment agility. Helfer was previously honored by CRN as one of the Top 50 Channel Chiefs of 2014.

Note: Helfer recently left Juniper to join Lookout as vice president of worldwide channel development.

Kaspersky Lab, Jim Sullivan, Director of Channel Sales

Sullivan has more than a decade of experience in the IT security space. The midmarket represents a large part of Kaspersky's endpoint security business, and its solutions are built from the same code base, making them easily implemented for the various needs of midmarket businesses. Sullivan is dedicated to listening to midmarket customers' needs and developing a value proposition customized for each organization's unique requirements. Under Sullivan's leadership, corporate midmarket bookings through VARs increased 74 percent during the first half of 2014 year-over-year. Sullivan works closely with partners to drive continued profitability.

LifeSize, Matthew Collier, Vice President of America Sales

Collier has been in his current role driving midmarket sales at LifeSize, a pioneer in high-definition video communications solutions, for the past year, although his experience in midmarket IT spans his professional career. Collier works to maximize the business success of midmarket customers, and he has inspired his midmarket sales team and channel partners to achieve tremendous results. The LifeSize Cloud is built for the midmarket as it addresses the common concerns that IT executives of midsize organizations face. The more than 100 midmarket customer success stories that LifeSize has acquired under Collier's leadership are proof of his team's success.

Microsoft/US Small, Midmarket Solutions & Partners Group (US SMS&P), David Willis, Corporate Vice President

Willis and his leadership team are responsible for ensuring that Microsoft and its partners deliver tech-based business solutions to meet the needs of its 20 million commercial customers in the U.S. Willis understands the positive impact of the midmarket on the future of the economy. The combination of the midmarket's entrepreneurial spirit and need for innovation is complementary with what Microsoft offers, including its services, software, hardware and the broad partner ecosystem, which allow it to provide innovative solutions. Willis joined Microsoft in 1992 and has held a variety of senior sales and marketing leadership positions.

NEC Corp. of America, Kevin Hooper, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Enterprise Solutions

Hooper brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the midmarket. He understands the unique challenges and issues that midmarket executives face and brings a deep knowledge of what solutions work best in this market segment. He is a proven leader with more than 20 years of business development and sales leadership experience, including previous executive positions with HP and IBM. Under Hooper's leadership, NEC's offerings have been recognized for bringing innovative solutions to the midmarket, winning two Best in Innovation awards at Healthcare IT Summit 2013 and Best in Innovation at MES East 2014. Hooper and his team at NEC offer communications, managed services and technology solutions that address the midmarket's specific needs.

NetApp, Regina Kunkle, Vice President, Americas Channel

Kunkle has been instrumental in evolving the NetApp Partner Program for the benefit of partners and the business opportunities they see for themselves and mutual customers in the midmarket. Under Kunkle's leadership, NetApp's midsize business program has grown to be a key part of its overall business. This momentum has enabled NetApp to become a market share leader for networked storage systems under $40,000. Under her leadership, NetApp midmarket products and solutions also have been recognized as leaders in this segment -- the NetApp FAS2200 series was named a "champion" and "best in overall value" by Info-Tech Research Group.

Oracle, Tom LaRocca, Vice President of Worldwide Partner Strategy and Alliances

LaRocca has more than 20 years of proven industry experience, and has a strong grasp of the potential impediments and accelerators to help partners grow their businesses. His efforts have resulted in improved account segmentation that opens new opportunities for partners to sell into Oracle accounts, more joint pursuit opportunities with Oracle, and programs designed to recognize and reward unique partner value-add. The midmarket is a critical customer segment for Oracle and its partners, with needs and challenges that Oracle's products and solutions are uniquely designed to solve. LaRocca's patience, clarity of purpose, determination and a willingness to drive make his efforts in the midmarket stand out.

ProfitBricks, Axel Herr, COO

Herr joined ProfitBricks, an IaaS service provider, following a 30-year career in the IT, consumer electronics, software development and publishing sectors. Before joining ProfitBricks, he worked as an independent consultant establishing a variety of businesses in Europe and the Middle East, and previously has held leadership positions at SEGA, Konami, Nintendo and THQ. He has a unique ability to understand the cloud computing goals of midmarket organizations and is focused on ensuring that the ProfitBricks team members responsible for pre-sales and post-sales also understand those initiatives. Herr believes that in 2014 and beyond, the industry will see midsize organizations accelerate their deployments of the cloud.

Reflexion Networks, Scott Barlow, Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing

Barlow has an extensive record of achievement in channel leadership, revenue growth and international business development. He is an industry-recognized Channel Chief, Top 50 Midmarket Channel Executive and IPED Channel Master. During his tenure at Reflexion, Barlow and his team have recruited more than 5,000 solution provider partners across 55 countries, established major distribution, OEM and strategic relationships and built a base of more than 17,000 customers. The midmarket is a vital component to Reflexion's go-to-market strategy, enabling organizations to leverage the value of cloud services to quickly and cost-effectively achieve compliance and improve their overall security posture.

RingCentral, David Berman, President

With more than 20 years of experience in software technology, Berman is known for his innovative, highly successful sales and go-to-market strategies, as well as his expertise in leading high-performing organizations. Prior to joining RingCentral, he served as president and CEO of Affectiva, where he developed the Affex SaaS platform for facial coding based on MIT research. Berman respects midmarket customers for their ability to make or break a growing SaaS company, and the midmarket has been a steady source of growth for RingCentral under Berman's leadership. He currently leads a team to bring cloud-based business phone systems and collaboration tools to more than 300,000 customers, many of which are midsize.

Ruckus Wireless, Ron Gill, Vice President of Americas Enterprise Sales

Gill joined Ruckus in 2008 and brings more than 20 years of experience leading sales organizations that sell both wired and wireless network solutions. Under Gill's leadership, Ruckus remains keenly focused on serving midmarket companies that have limited resources and IT staff. Gill continues to help maximize the growth and nurturing of the Ruckus channel in the midmarket, consistently helping the company add a significant amount of new partners year after year, and effectively leading the company's efforts to help keep them productive and successful for its mutual clients. Ruckus' smart Wi-Fi solutions are built and tailored specifically for the midmarket, and Gill is positioned to move the needle.

SAP, Kevin Gilroy, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Global Channels, SAP Global Partner Operations

Gilroy is responsible for leading sales for the small to midsize segment of SAP's business, where he is focused on strengthening SAP's competitive advantage with global solution providers and partners with a strategic focus on the midmarket. As a former CEO of a small business, Gilroy knows what small and midsize enterprises need from an IT vendor to transform their company and surpass their competitors. His ambition and relentless drive for success make him a role model for SAP and its more than 11,500 partners that serve the midmarket. More than 80 percent of SAP's customers are small and midsize enterprises, so Gilroy and his team understand the challenges that these businesses face.

SAS, Kevin Garabedian, Senior Director, Small and Midsize Business Solutions

Garabedian has a high level of passion and focus for working with small and midsize companies to help them utilize technology to foster growth. An accomplished leader and 20-year IT veteran with strong managerial and strategic sales skills, Garabedian has an extensive software sales and sales management background. With his innovativeness, Garabedian and SAS bring comprehensive analytical software to the midmarket that can help CIOs be more competitive and optimize what they're doing with their data at a price point they can afford. Garabedian knows the midmarket must take advantage of technology in order to remain competitive against the larger companies, and he is strategically positioned to help them do so.

Scale Computing, Jason Collier, CTO

As a founder and chief technology officer at Scale Computing, Collier is responsible for the technology vision of the company. He is an IT infrastructure innovator striving to deliver simple and cost-effective solutions that address the needs of midmarket companies, which are the primary customers of Scale's virtualization platform. He has been crucial in the development of several products, such as the HC3, and is focused on this market solving real problems he faced himself as an IT executive in small businesses. Collier knows firsthand that every day as a midmarket IT executive requires firefighting skills just to keep things status quo, and he is dedicated to finding ways to simplify their lives.

ShoreTel, Mark Roberts, CMO

Roberts joined ShoreTel in December 2013 as chief marketing officer, bringing 20 years of technology sales, marketing and product management experience. He has spent most of his career at technology companies, holding senior positions at Mitel, NexTraq, Polycom, 3Com and Intel. Roberts connects with the midmarket and understands that midsize companies can't afford to languish, which drives his creativity, risk-taking and innovative ways. Upon his arrival, Roberts restructured ShoreTel's marketing group within eight months, and now delivers 30 percent more in revenue, making marketing one of the most important functions in the company.

SimpliVity, Doron Kempel, CEO and Chairman

Kempel is founder and CEO of SimpliVity, and is a serial entrepreneur, founding and leading companies and their divisions. Kempel understands that midmarket organizations have constraints that their larger counterparts do not, including limited resources and budgets, so he designed SimpliVity's hyper-converged infrastructure to assimilate several core data center functions into a single solution, saving both time and money. Kempel has built a leadership team and a worldwide network of partners to rapidly scale operations, and since launching in April 2013 simultaneously in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, SimpliVity has more than 250 channel partners and 300 customers, many of which are midsize.

Soonr, Ahmet Tuncay, CEO

Tuncay is an experienced and operationally focused serial entrepreneur committed to developing solid products that solve real-world problems. He joined Soonr, a file-sharing and collaboration SaaS provider, with an extensive technical background and executive skillset spanning communications, wireless, networking and software products for business, consumer and service provider markets. Tuncay believes that with mobile, SaaS and cloud technologies, what was once reserved for the largest enterprises is now easily accessible to the midmarket. He is a business-savvy executive who doesn't subscribe to the latest trends without vetting out the real value and implication for customers and the business.

Sophos, Michael Valentine, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales

With more than 20 years of senior sales and channel experience at global IT security companies, Valentine most recently served as vice president, Americas sales and support at Fortinet and joined Sophos in 2013. He is a recognized and respected sales executive who in 2008 and 2009 was named a top "Channel Chief" by CRN magazine. He saw the opportunity to focus on the midmarket by leading worldwide sales at Sophos and is excited by the opportunity to deliver world-class products to midmarket businesses. His peers consider him legendary, and he works side by side with marketing to ensure Sophos' messaging is 100 percent focused on midmarket pain points.

SOTI, Charlie Grieco, Vice President, North American Sales

Grieco joined SOTI in 2012 as executive director of strategic alliances and was quickly promoted to his current role. His leadership and strategic approach have been pivotal in growing sales of SOTI's mobility management solution, MobiControl, by 38 percent year-over-year. Throughout his career, Grieco has worked with midsize companies across North America to build long-lasting relationships with midmarket executives and IT departments. His mobility expertise and consultative approach have enabled midmarket customers to leverage mobility to grow their businesses, which is why his midmarket customers value him. Grieco's high-performance leadership style and dedication to empowering the midmarket inspires both customer and employee loyalty.

StorageCraft Technology, Curt James, Vice President of Marketing and Business Development

James has held his current role for more than 10 years since the company's founding, and provides direction for channel, branding, advertising and marketing programs. Prior to StorageCraft, Curt spent 18 years in various roles in the software industry and was a founding member of a number of e-commerce companies. James has led StorageCraft in its progression from a startup to a small business to a midsize business. Therefore, he understands the struggles midsize companies face and strives to deliver products that midmarket organizations can trust with their data. James has a reputation as a visionary leader exuding excellence, and promotes an environment that fosters success.

Symantec, John Belle, Vice President, Inside Sales

Belle oversees 350 midmarket-focused salespeople across North America at Symantec. He focuses on improving the customer and partner experience within the midmarket, and drives alignment between sales, marketing, operations and development within Symantec. Prior to his current role, Belle led various Symantec channel sales organizations aimed at the midmarket as well, so he has dedicated his career to serving the needs of midmarket CIOs. He is a strategic leader known for his strong intellect and charisma, his ability to inspire colleagues and his commitment to customer satisfaction.

Trend Micro, Vince Kearns, Vice President

Kearns leads the U.S. sales operation for small and midsize business at Trend Micro. He is responsible for the development and execution of strategic sales strategies, marketing plans and channel enablement tailored to the midmarket. Kearns has 19 years of experience managing SMB sales teams, and has increased revenue by more than 50 percent and expanded the midmarket organization size by 20 percent. He was named to the Top 25 Most influential Inside Sales professionals by AA-ISP in 2010, and challenged product management in 2011 to develop solutions that resonated with midmarket firms without sacrificing product features or ease of use.

VMware, Brandon Sweeney, Vice President, U.S. Midmarket and SMB Sales

Sweeney, who joined VMware 11 years ago, is responsible for both customer acquisition and serving existing midmarket customers. He brings together VMware's midmarket sales, channel and marketing efforts. Sweeney is a constant evangelist for the midmarket customer both internally and externally, and is focused on making sure the voice of the midmarket customer is heard across VMware executives, product teams and customer support teams. Through server virtualization, Sweeney and the VMware team help companies consolidate apps to deliver up to 50 percent savings in capital and operating costs. In addition, he created a midmarket customer advisory board to ensure constant contact from top midmarket CIOs and VMware.

WatchGuard Technologies, Alex Thurber, Vice President of Sales

Thurber leads all aspects of the WatchGuard sales organization in the Americas and EMEA geographies, including field sales, systems engineering and sales operations. Before joining WatchGuard, Thurber held titles at Tripwire, McAfee and Cisco. The one thing that has remained a constant throughout his career in IT is his dedication to the midmarket. He is aware of the constrained budget and staffing challenges that midmarket CIOs face, and is focused on providing the necessary security to maximize Internet-driven productivity at a reasonable price.

Xerox , John Corley, President, Channel Partner Operations

Corley has recently entered his current position at Xerox after previously serving as senior vice president and general manager of Canadian operations for Xerox Canada. He is accelerating growth in the midmarket segment through Xerox's channel partners in both North America and Western Europe. Corley leads the group with a deep understanding of indirect sales, bringing a channel-centric focus to the integration of operations, marketing and product development. His vision helps demonstrate the benefits of Xerox partnership to technology and services partners across the globe.