VMware Veteran CTO Exits for VC Firm

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For VMware, there’s no nice and easy way to say that Herrod’s departure is a serious blow. He was largely regarded as VMware’s prominent evangelist, playing a central role in the creation and development of virtualization technology. And, in his 11 years at VMware, he is credited with constructing a top-flight engineering organization, crafting innovative virtualization solutions, engaging with the vendor’s partner ecosystem, and influencing its patent portfolio and open source strategy.

“Joining General Catalyst allows me to combine my three greatest professional passions: developing meaningful new technologies, building companies with strong technical teams and sharing my engineering and leadership experience,” said Herrod. “I was particularly drawn to the firm’s focus of partnering closely with entrepreneurs and I look forward to living that credo each day.”

Not surprisingly, VMware has not named a successor, although a company spokesperson confirmed that a search is under way, according to one report.

Herrod, who also held the virtualization kingpin’s research and development senior vice president post, will continue to assist VMware as a strategic adviser and maintain his role as an EMC consultant as well. VMware has seen meteoric growth in Herrod’s tenure, from 90 employees to some 13,000 hands on deck now.

In a blog post, Herrod said that at General Catalyst he will be tasked with “finding, supporting, and developing great technical entrepreneurs as they build the products and companies that they’ve always dreamt of building.” For Herrod, it certainly seems like a good deal—uncovering new companies to carry the virtualization banner into the next wave of innovation. He said that at General Catalyst he hopes to leverage his VMware “team building experience” to “an even broader technology domain.”

Prior to VMware, Herrod co-led the development of a virtual CPU with “Code Morphing” technology at Transmeta and held engineering positions with Silicon Graphics and MIPS Technologies.