Channel People on the Move: AT&T, IBM, Fusion Connect, VMware, More
We also have moves at Cato Networks, Zoom, Avant, Equinix, ConnectWise, NetFortris and more.
![Avant's Emily Skaff (feature) Avant's Emily Skaff (feature)](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/blt95da390b4fe14a37/6524462d0b7888a2c0cf8233/Avant-Emily-Skaff-feature-gallery.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
Mitel has scooped up Jessica Maria, who partners likely know from stops at Pax8 and Intelisys. At Mitel, she will serve as group director, Americas partner marketing.
Patrick Pulvermueller is the man who will make decisions that trickle down to the channel at Acronis. The new CEO, most recently president of GoDaddy’s partners business, took over the top job at the backup and disaster recovery provider on July 1.
Pulvermueller took over for founder Serguei Beloussov, who will remain as chief research officer.
Learn more about this transition.
Zoom, which has had one of the biggest years in channel history, keeps adding to its team.
That’s Bud Kinzer on the left. His title is public sector channel leader. He oversees a team of channel account managers responsible for Zoom government and education vertical selling partners. His career stops include Splunk and NetApp.
On the right, that’s Lauren Endres. Based in the Twin Cities, she’s a new regional channel manager with the company. She most recently spent three years at Evolve IP.
Neeti Gupta brings more than 10 years of experience at Microsoft to her new job at VMware. And it’s appropriate since her title is senior director, alliances – Microsoft.
Other stops on her career path included Amazon, Facebook and GE Healthcare.
Armor has a new chief revenue officer in Bryan Hauptman. His hiring comes as Armor works to expand its MSP base and continue to help customers get their security and compliance houses in order.
Hauptman comes to Armor from ThreatConnect, where he also was CRO. The channel might know him best from his days as Datto’s senior VP of global sales.
Get the full scoop on Hauptman.
Michael Czerneda landed a new gig as director, regional channel sales, Nextiva. He will represent the business communications provider’s Southwest region.
Czerneda arrives at Nextiva from OneStream Networks, where he was VP of channel sales for the West. His career path has taken him through Broadsoft, Saddleback Communications and Mitel as well.
Infoblox, which provides cloud-first DDI and DNS security services, named Brad Rinklin its new chief marketing officer and executive vice president. He will lead the global marketing team to grow demand for the company’s products.
Rinklin comes to Infoblox from VMware’s security division, Carbon Black. There, he was global marketing leader. Other previous employers include Eze Software, where he was CMO, and Akamai, where the channel community knows him from his role as SVP of global partner sales.
Meet Brian Wassel, a new senior partner development manager with Telarus. He is based in Chicago.
The channel knows him from a couple of stops at Vonage. His experience dates back to his days at Cbeyond, and then Birch after the latter bought the former.
FiberLight, which provides fiber infrastructure, hired Will Sears as chief revenue officer. He will lead the company’s sales initiatives.
He brings 20 years in telecommunications experience to the job, most recently as CRO at Logix Fiber Networks. He has led product launches and initiated new channel programs in his career.
Sarah Macdonald joins the team at SD-WAN provider Bigleaf as channel sales manager for the Midwest. She is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Her experience includes sales development rep at Service Express, account exec at Robert Half and talent acquisition manager at Trace3.
AT&T welcomed Tyler Price into its fold as a senior channel manager. He is based in Denver.
Price comes to the carrier from cable giant Comcast Business, where he was a partner sales manager for nearly three years. Before that, he held the title of partner account manager for more than three years at the cableco.
Longtime channel vets with experience from Intelisys, Windstream and TPx will now assist Fusion Connect partners.
Clockwise from right: Jorel Potts, senior channel manager in the West (TPx and Windstream alum); Samantha Zuniga, VP of channel operations and programs (18-year Intelisys vet); and Diane Frazzetta, regional VP of channel sales, East (experience from Intelisys and LogMeIn).
The full story is here.
A new regional sales director for Cato Networks, Brian Ficek brings some SD-WAN clout to the role from his three years at Bigleaf.
He brings experience from some other big channel names; notably, Windstream, Inteliquent, PGi and Comcast.
Services distributor TBI named two additions to its team, and one promotion.
That’s Bruce Ware on the left. He’s a new regional channel manager with the company, supporting partners in the South Central region.
In the middle you see John Rozinsky, director of sales for the Midwest and West. It’s a promotion at TBI for the Evolve IP, Momentum Telecom, Avaya and Verizon alumnus.
And that’s Chris Holloway, senior director of channel sales, on the right. He spent three years at Fuze before making the move to TBI, where he will work to grow the channel team in the south central U.S.
ConnectWise hired Regina Marrow to be its new chief information officer. She’s charged with running the company’s global business and financial services teams.
Marrow’s last job was with Ernst & Young. She’s excited to take on a new role at a rapidly growing company whose needs are changing, as well as how it supports its partners.
Learn more about Marrow’s new gig.
Services distributor Avant Communications added a few people to its channel family.
Clockwise from top right: Emily Skaff, inside channel manager, East; Brittany Ruth, inside channel manager, based in Florida; Dan Cronin, senior partner manager, based in Boston; and David Barthelemy, senior channel manager, Florida.
Ashley Shaw is the new VP of customer success at Nfinit, the provider of hybrid cloud, connectivity and colocation products and services. Her job is to spearhead the company’s customer success program as it continues to grow and evolve.
Shaw most recently was director of client services at TrueCommerce, a software e-commerce business.
Upstack, the upstart direct selling agency and sourcing platform, keeps making significant hires.
Meghan Hambacher Wilkinson (right) is the company’s new senior VP of customer experience. She will oversee support for vendors, agents and end-user businesses. You probably know her from career stops at Level 3, CenturyLink and a brief stop at Telarus.
Also new to the team is John Giaquinta. He comes to Upstack via its acquisition of DataCenterAndColocation.com, where Giaquinta was president and CEO. He joins as a partner, managing director and equity stakeholder.
Learn more about Wilkinson and Giaquinta.
CoreDial, the cloud, video collaboration and contact center provider, tapped Jason Harper as its new CTO. He will lead the company’s product management, software development and cloud services teams.
Harper, who has extensive UCaaS and SaaS experience, joins CoreDial from GameChanger Media, a Dick’s Sporting Goods subsidiary. Before that, he was VP of infrastructure engineering at Vidyo, and brings experience from ShoreTel as well.
There are a flurry of new faces at NetFortris, the managed cloud and network services provider. All recently worked at TPx.
Clockwise from top right: Rik Eppard, VP of sales operations, most recently director of the UCx line of business at TPx; Darrell Royal, VP of sales for the West, a TPx, Momentum Telecom and Comcast veteran; Nathan Pravelka, VP of sales, whose last gig was TPx director or marketing and business development; and Raquel Wiley, VP of marketing, who brings 25 years of experience from TPx and AT&T.
Randy Streu is the new VP of business development at cybersecurity provider CyCognito. His job is to identify growth opportunities and build relationships. He is also tasked with expanding and strengthening CyCognito’s relationships with technology, strategic alliance and OEM partners.
He most recently led strategic and technical alliances for SecurityScorecard. Other stops in Streu’s career include Sumo Logic and HPE.
Distributor Exclusive Networks named Brian Vincik VP of North America. It’s a promotion for Vincik, who joined Exclusive earlier this year as VP of advanced networking. In that role, he led the unit responsible for recruiting vendor partners, and onboarding new and lasting VAR relationships.
He has more than 40 years of experience, including 24 years at HP.
Adaire Fox-Martin is the new EMEA cloud president for Google Cloud.
The SAP and Oracle veteran is based in Dublin. She will lead the Google Cloud sales organization for EMEA, tasked with strengthening the go-to-market strategy and supporting customers’ digital-transformation journeys.
Data center services provider Equinix made key additions to its team.
Left to right: Orla Ni Chorcora, VP of channel for EMEA, who spent 24 years at Oracle; Sophie Ben Sadia, VP of sales for APAC partners, after doing four-and-a-half-years at Schneider Electric; and Ben Thames, a 10-year company veteran who was promoted to VP of the Americas channel.
Get the full scoop on these hires and promotions.
IBM president Jim Whitehurst, who previously led Red Hat, stepped down in what many deemed to be a surprise move.
Whitehurst was president and CEO of Red Hat before IBM bought it. His departure is one of several changes among the top ranks at Big Blue.
Whitehurst remains a senior adviser to the company.
Learn more about his exit from the presidency.
Lunavi, which recently rebranded from Green House Data, named Sam Galeotos its new CEO.
The data center and managed service provider offers cloud solutions, modern app development and more. It also has 45,000 square feet of data center space in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
Founder and CEO Shawn Mills will remain on the executive team as president. Galeotos is a seven-year veteran of Lunavi/Green House Data.
Kelly Wood’s new job is senior manager, implementation, at Telapprise, which provides various business communications and network transformation services.
The 10-year AppSmart/WTG alumnus spent one year at Ziply Fiber before taking her new gig.
High Wire Networks introduced David Hand as vice president of global system integrators (GSIs) the same day it said it was expanding it channel to include GSIs. His job, as you might expect, will be to develop and accelerate strategic partnerships with this partner base.
You might remember him from a similar role he held at Nortel back in the day.
High Wire Networks’ services include design, installation, configuration and support for unified communications, wired and wireless networks, cabling and electrical systems.
Read more about Hand and the new program.
Bill McLaughlin is Thrive‘s first-ever chief customer officer.
McLaughlin brintgs 20 years of managed services industry experience to the company that bills itself a provider of “next-gen managed services.” His job will be to frive more value, messaging, communication and faster platform adoption to Thrive’s customers.
Prior to Thrive, McLaughlin held a senior leadership role at Kaseya, where he completed an expedited one-year IT management software journey.
Cloud security startup Dasera hired three women for prominent roles.
Left to right: Deepti Hemwani, head of product, who most recently was senior product manager for Cisco; April Mitchell, head of engineering, whose last gig was chief of staff for Cisco DevNet; and Erin Swanson, VP of marketing, who comes to Dasera from Demisto, the SOAR vendor that Palo Alto Networks bought in 2019.
Cloud security startup Dasera hired three women for prominent roles.
Left to right: Deepti Hemwani, head of product, who most recently was senior product manager for Cisco; April Mitchell, head of engineering, whose last gig was chief of staff for Cisco DevNet; and Erin Swanson, VP of marketing, who comes to Dasera from Demisto, the SOAR vendor that Palo Alto Networks bought in 2019.
IBM, VMware, TBI, Telarus, ConnectWise, Equinix and AT&T are among the companies whose HR departments have been busy lately.
Our latest edition of Channel People on the Move features the biggest personnel moves that made headlines in July.
Agents wanted to learn about new channel managers at Zoom and AT&T. They were also curious about the exodus of TPx channel people taking up residence at NetFortris. VARs and MSPs wanted to know about a new hire at VMware who will lead the Microsoft alliance. Also of note to this group of partners: IBM’s president stepping down in what many called a surprise move.
We’ve got close to 50 new hires and promotions in the slideshow above, and that barely scratches the surface. The channel is constantly evolving! Want someone included in our monthly channel people on the move feature? My email is in the box at the bottom of this page. Not only will you or a colleague appear in our slideshow, you might get your own feature that winds up on this page. That’s right — you don’t have to wait a month to see channel people on the move. We have an entire section of our website that we have dedicated to it. Join those from IBM, VMware, TBI, Telarus and more whose personnel moves make it to Channel Futures.
If you missed last month’s edition, it’s available here.
Want to contact the author directly about this story? Have ideas for a follow-up article? Email Craig Galbraith or connect with him on LinkedIn. |
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