VMware Veteran Joins Virtual Instruments

Doug Smith, VMware’s (NYSE: VMW) former VP of global partner strategy, is now running global partner sales for Virtual Instruments, a San Jose, Calif.-headquartered infrastructure performance management provider founded in 2008. Here’s the background…

Smith, who is overseeing Virtual Instruments’ channel relationships with OEMs, channel partners, systems integrators, and alliances, confirmed the move both on his LinkedIn profile and his Twitter account, where he described his position as “I run global partner sales at Virtual Instruments.” He added a side note that he’s keyed in on cloud computing, virtualization and sales productivity.

Virtual Instruments is headed by John Thompson, the former chairman and chief executive at Symantec and general manager of IBM Americas, who took the helm in 2010. The company, which is backed by investment capital from four venture firms, said in a press release on Wednesday that its flagship VirtualWisdom infrastructure performance management platform has seen a 50 percent increase in customer adoption in the past six months in a market pegged to reach $9 billion globally by 2015.

Smith, who joined VMware in 2007, ascended to North America channel chief two years later in a global channels reorganization, taking over for Steve Houck, the company's worldwide channels vice president at the time. In his four-year run, Smith had a hand in the rebranding and launch of the VMware Partner Network, the Partner Central Partner portal, enhancements to the VMware advantage+ opportunity registration program, vertical market initiatives and an emphasis on partner competencies.

On his LinkedIn profile, Smith lists tripling VMware’s channel-generated revenue in four years, doubling the partner base and implementing the vendor’s first outreach campaign across multiple social media channels as among his major accomplishments. At the time of his departure, Smith had been evangelizing VMware software-defined datacenters.

Prior to his stint at VMware, Smith served as business development senior director at EMC (NYSE: EMC) for nine years where he shepherded OEM software alliances and steered key consulting practices.

Part of his new responsibilities likely will be to extend Virtual Instruments’ Partner Program (VIP). The program is tiered by three levels—Registered, Gold or Platinum–based on commitment to drive sales of the vendor’s products and services. VIP members provide solutions to meet their customers’ SAN and virtual infrastructure performance monitoring, troubleshooting and optimization requirements.