Tod Nielsen named VMware COO
January 7, 2009 —
VMware may have gotten a much-needed boost in leadership by bringing in former Borland Software president and CEO Tod Nielsen to serve as chief operating officer.
Nielsen, 43, will work with Paul Maritz, VMware’s president and CEO, to help VMware battle Microsoft and its Hyper-V hypervisor in the virtualization market. Nielsen and Maritz worked together in the past at Microsoft.
“In this newly created role, Tod brings unique skills and capabilities that will help us improve our operational focus and enhance our execution across all areas of the business,” Maritz said. “With Tod on board, I will be able to devote more of my time to the product strategy and development, while Tod focuses more on business, marketing and operations. Having worked closely with Tod in the past, I know that we will work effectively together and complement each other.”
Named to the position yesterday, Nielsen joins VMware after the company parted ways with cofounders Diane Greene and Mendel Rosenblum in the late 2008. Richard Sarwal, executive vice president of research and development, and Paul Chan, vice president of product development, also resigned, giving the impression that some high-level figures at the company were jumping ship.
However, Charles King, president and principal analyst with Pund-IT, said that Nielsen’s marketing and leadership experience will benefit VMware greatly.
“On first glance, he looks like he’ll be a terrific fit over there,” King said. “He’s got both the technical and sales experience that should serve him and VMware very well. From a long-term standpoint, I think bringing in Nielsen as COO should ensure that VMware has a very steady hand on the day-to-day operational tiller, which should allow Maritz a bit more latitude in product development and company strategy.”
Multiple analysts have criticized VMware’s marketing efforts in recent months, saying the company has great technology but only mediocre marketing ability. King said he wasn’t sure about how Nielsen would tie in with VMware’s marketing organization in his role as COO, but his previous experience in marketing should help create some synergies between the two.
Prior to being an executive with Borland, Nielsen was a senior vice president of marketing and sales for Oracle, and the chief marketing officer for BEA Systems. He joined BEA after it acquired Web services provider Crossgain, for which Nielsen served as CEO. Additionally, Nielsen spent 12 years at Microsoft, serving in such roles as general manager of database and developer tools, and vice president of Microsoft’s platform group.
Related Search Term(s): Microsoft, VMware
Share this link: http://sdt.bz/33166
Most Read Latest News Blog Resources
Zeichick’s Take: Radio moves from analog waveforms to digital packets
Streaming radio highlights the need for streaming applications to be designed to take up as little bandwidth as possible
|
|
Taking enterprise architecture to the business side
Startup Corso is bringing out a cloud-based planning platform that ties into business plans
|
|
Appcelerator Acquires Cocoafish to Add Instant Mobile Cloud Capabilities to its Industry Leading Titanium Platform
Appcelerator Offers Messaging, Social, Location and Storage Mobile Cloud Services to All Mobile App Publishers
|
|
ComponentOne Releases a Collection of 40+ UI Widgets Powered by HTML5 and jQuery
ComponentOne has announced the 2012 release of Wijmo: a kit of UI widgets for HTML5 and jQuery development
|
Taking enterprise architecture to the business side
Startup Corso is bringing out a cloud-based planning platform that ties into business plans
|
|
Top five apps to manage your workload
Web applications offer new ways to track your “to-do” lists
|
|
Not so fast when it comes to testing in the cloud
Developers face outsourcing, virtual lab management and mobile devices as obstacles
|
|
Xceed releases UX-focused suite for Microsoft’s WPF
"Blendables" helps match user experiences to developer visions
|
Are you at risk for burnout?
Burnout is a severe problem and it can strike at any time. Here's how to tell if you are nearing the edge.
|
|
Agility, mom, and apple pie
If we're to evaluate the state-of-the-art in software development, we should start with the values espoused in the Agile Manifesto.
|
|
RIM woos developers with free tablet
How do you get more apps ported to the BlackBerry PlayBook? By giving every developer a free tablet, of course!
|
|
GitHire: Use Headhunters to Find Your Perfect Programmer
Are you a hiring manager tired of scouring the job boards? Check out this new service that will find 5 people interested in your jobs.
|
The Hidden Costs of Software Licensing
Moving beyond paper-based software licensing to more flexible, software-based licensing is a business decision. There is a growing trend tow...
|
|
Case Study: You May Need a Development Mechanic
As a contractor for a major financial player in Germany, SOBEGE, a German-based consultancy specializing in embedded IT and web services, wa...
|
|
Ensuring Software Quality at a Major International Bank
One of the world’s leading international banks has adopted AgitarOne technology for delivering generated unit tests for their Java software...
|
|
Load Testing Adobe Flex Applications
Adobe Flex applications may be different from applications you’ve worked with before. For classic HTML web applications, the server does all...
|
Related Articles
VMware faces threats from economy, Microsoft
CEO Paul Maritz is confident in VMware's long-term growth through the global economic downturn, and so far the company has seen increased revenue despite its management shakeup. Theresa Lanowitz says that competitors, particularly Microsoft, are still poised to decrease VMware's market share.
|
Shakeup at VMware shows its lead is shrinking
While Diane Greene was hailed for her technological intelligence, her business acumen left much to be desired. She was removed as CEO in order to bolster its lead, which is being threatened by companies like Microsoft and Oracle.
|
VMware open-source toolkit automates virtualization tasks
The beta release, which is tied to Windows PowerShell, offers modular programming for automating common tasks.
|