Wednesday's Whispers: The Word On The Street - May 2009


PEOPLE WHISPERS: MOVES, PROMOTIONS, AND MILESTONES*
Congratulations to all!  Thanks for your emails and alerts.  If you’ve got a change or know of a promotion, keep dropping me a line!  If you need a referral, don't hesitate to reach out to me via Linked In.
Bronwyn J. Allen became Director, Analyst Relations at Fujitsu America, Inc. in January 2009.  Bronwyn brings over 20 years of AR and marketing communications experience for professional services firms.
Scott Azzolina is now VP Marketing at Connectria, an IT outsourcing and hosting company.  Scott brings over 25 years of experience from roles at Primavera Systems, Gemplus(Axalto), PECO Energy Company, Unisys, Scott Paper, and NCR.
Jonathan Bennett became Sales Executive - West at Astadia, a SaaS professional services firm, in March 2009.  Bennett is a driving force in solutions selling in the enterprise software industry with SaaS pedigree as a Managing Director at EnablePath and Sr. Account Executive at Salesforce.com. Previous roles include Manager of presales at Pilot Software (now SAP), Manager of Professional Services (BSG) at E*TRADE Financial, Senior Technical Sales Consultant at Personify, Inc. and management Consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers
Jim Bork named Senior Vice President of World Wide Sales for Epicor Software. Jim brings 16 years of sales and sales management experience including international sales for Epicor. Jim's expertise includes go-to-market strategies and sales management experience.

Sean Cantelon is now Managing Director at O.C. Tanner.  Sean last served as a seasoned star sales professional focused on building relationships and delivering solutions to his clients for Forrester Research and Giga Research.  Other experiences include working as an Account Manager at MCI Systemhouse.
Stephane Carrez became Head of Planzone R&D at Augeo Software in November 2008. Stephane has held many technical roles at Solsoft, Sun Micrososystems, and Chorus Systems.
Chayson Comfort is now Business Development Executive at Statera, a professional services firm focused on business performance.  Chayson served as as star sales professional and National Account Executive at Forrester Research. Chayson also worked at Verizon Information Services.
Pete Daffern became CEO at ClairMail, Inc in January 2009.  As CEO of Pursima, he led the successful acquisition by D&B in October 2007.  Pete brings executive experiences as President of AIM technology, VP of Business Development for Vitria, and General Manager of Seagate EMEA.
Mike Frichol became Principal at Ingistics, LLC in February 2009.  Mike brings a wealth of executive level industry marketing and product marketing experiences from Infor, Microsoft Business Solutions, ESI, and Dun & Bradstreet Software.
Jason Gatoff in March 2009 became Director of Marketing and Strategic Alliances at M-Factor, Inc. a profit and revenue optimization software firm.  Jason previously served as Program Director and Peer Forum advisor for AMR Research's SAP clients.  Other marketing roles include work in Analyst Relations and Corporate Marketing for PeopleSoft and i2 Technologies.  Jason also served as a Client Relationship Manager at Forrester Research.
Rob Howes is now Assistant Director of Admissions / International Recruitment at DeVry University. Rob served as an Account Manager for Federal Government at Forrester Research.  Previous higher education experience include roles at CDI College.
Alp Hug became President & CEO of Alpland in February 2009.  Alp was formerly the Senior Vice President at Open Text for ECM Suite Technology.  He came to OpenText via the Hummingbird acquisition where he was the VP for Strategic Business Development.  Alp served other high tech executive roles at Delano Technology and TOR Computerized Systems.
Narayan Iyer is now Director at Cognizant Technology Solutions. Prior to his new role, he was the head of banking, financial services & insurance sales in India for Tata Consulting Services and had served various roles there for 5 years.
Charlotte Marchand is now Directrice Commerciale Adjointe at Neteven.  Charlotte served sales roles at Forrester in Australia and France.
Suhail Maqsood became Board Member - Projects SIG at Oracle Applications Users Group in February 2009
Tamara Mendelsohn became Community and Marketing Manager at Eventbrite in January 2009.  Tamara was Forrester's star analyst in eCommerce.  She's currently finishing her last year of her MBA at The Sloan School of Management (MIT).
Doug Merritt was promoted to EVP & GM Premier Customer Network at SAP in January 2009.  Doug also serves as the President of SAP Laps and is a Corporate Officer for SAP.  Senior executive roles throughout the tech industry include VP & GM of HCM at PeopleSoft, CEO and Founder of Icarian, and Sales Manager at BMC.
Clark Newby joins Workday as the CMO and Vice President of Marketing.  Clark joined Workday from Fortify where he served as a Vice President of Marketing.  Other marketing roles include Poly Serve, Mercury Interactive, Kintana, and Silicon Graphics.
Michael Pietrini named CFO and EVP of Finance and Administration at Epicor Software in April 2009. Pietrini's 14 year tenure at Epicor includes roles in sales management, consulting, customer service, product development, marketing, and business development.  His responsibilities include sales operations, legal, human resources, IT and investor relations.
Eduardo Sanchez returns to MicroStrategy as the Executive Vice President for Strategic Development.  Sanchez previously was the EVP for Global Sales at Lawson, the COO of Cartesis, and a Corporate Vice President for World Wide Sales and Services and Vice President for International Operations at MicroStrategy
Brian Shelver became Senior Sales Engineer at Topaz Bridge in February 2009.  Brian played industry marketing and solutions selling roles at Kineticsware, Inc., Microsoft Business Solutions, and SAP America.
Shivani Shinde has been promoted to Principal Correspondent at Business Standard.  Shivani brings a rich set of journalism experience serving as a Senior Correspondent and Acting Bureau Chief of the Indian Express group and Senior Reporter at the Times of India.
Eric Steele joins Veritude, A Fidelity Investments Company in Business Development.  Steele was a star sales professional at Forrester focusing on building strong relationships and solution selling.  Other sales experiences include sales roles at Innovative.
Patric Timmermans now serves as a VP Marketing at KPA, LLC a boutique HR and Environmental Compliance professional services firm. Patrick's previous roles include serving as a Senior Director Industry and Product Marketing at Infor, and various marketing roles at SSA Global and a a Principal Architect at Baan.
Joel Wecksell became Managing Director at The Skills Connection in January 2009.  Joel served as a Global Managing Vice President, Global Research Group Vice President and Vice President and Services Director for Business Applications at Gartner Group Inc.
Hannah Young was promoted to Senior Account Executive at Waggener Edstrom. Hannah has served many high tech sales professional positions including Account Executive at Forrester Research, Oracle Corporation, Cydcor, and Opinion Research Corporation International. Hannah focuses on building strong relationships and finding win-win solutions.
CORPORATE WHISPERS
Hearing from twitterati, software execs, and industry experts about:

  • High demand for third party maintenance option for Oracle Database, Oracle EBS, Infor, and SAP products.
  • SaaS acquisition being sought by IBM, Oracle, HP and SAP.
  • Hardware vendors such as Cisco and HP looking at adjuncts into the software space.
  • Telecom vendors such as AT&T, Bell Canada,  BT, and France Telecom looking at enterprise software plays to complement services and data center operations.
  • Micro-vertical vendors being drawn into more partnerships with Microsoft, IBM, SAP, and Oracle (MISO).
  • Partner opportunities with the large vendors at an all time high.  Lots of MDF and support unlike in past eras.

Got a scoop or something to share? Please post or send on to rwang0 at gmail dot com and we’ll keep your anonymity.
* Not responsible for any factual errors or omissions.  However, happy to correct any errors upon email receipt.
Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.