DEVOPSdigest

Puppet named Sanjay Mirchandani as its first-ever President and Chief Operating Officer to help fuel accelerated business growth, global expansion, and product innovation.

As President and COO, Mirchandani will direct all of Puppet’s go-to-market operations and execution, including marketing, pre-sales engineering, sales, partners, customer support, and services.

“Puppet has been scaling at a breakneck pace for the past 11 years, but we know that the biggest opportunities and challenges still lie ahead of us,” said Luke Kanies, founder and CEO of Puppet. “Sanjay is uniquely qualified to help us take advantage of that opportunity. He has repeatedly demonstrated his ability to execute global operations at the highest level in a broad range of roles. I am thrilled to partner with him to drive the next phase of Puppet’s growth and innovation.”

Mirchandani joins Puppet from VMware, where he was the corporate SVP and GM of Asia Pacific and Japan. He is a world-class business operator with a proven track record of leading rapidly-growing global organizations. In addition to his role at VMware, Mirchandani was at EMC for seven years in several roles. He lead the company's Global Centers of Excellence, its emerging markets and international development initiatives, and was global CIO for an award-winning IT organization. Prior to EMC, he held several field-based senior management roles at Microsoft during his 11-year career at the company.

“As a former CIO, I am intimately familiar with the challenges faced by IT organizations around the world, and understand how important it is for companies to get great software in front of their customers. CIOs are trying to figure out how to best take advantage of everything from cloud to containers, while dealing with massive tech legacy, and the realities of security and compliance,” said Mirchandani. “As a CIO, I saw how transformative Puppet’s technology was. That is why I am joining Puppet. Puppet is leading a revolution that will change the future of software. I have to be part of that.”

With Mirchandani aboard, Kanies will be able to spend more time on company and product strategy.

“Luke and Sanjay are a great match to lead Puppet through the next stage of the company’s growth,” said Gerri Elliott, Puppet board member. “With these changes, Luke can tenaciously focus on innovation, while Sanjay can focus on getting that innovation out to companies across the globe, and ensuring they are successful.”

Mirchandani holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Drew University and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Pittsburgh. He will be based out of Puppet’s Portland, Oregon, headquarters and will officially join the company as President and COO in May.