ELASTICON - Key Persons
Alison Gleeson was Senior Vice President of Cisco's Americas organization, responsible for more than $25 billion in annual sales and leading nearly 9,000 employees across 35 countries including Canada, Latin America, as well as segments such as US Commercial, US Public Sector, and the Global Enterprise Segment focused on Cisco's top 28 customers. A passionate speaker about the role of technology in enabling business transformation and empowering women in technology, Alison has received Connected World's "Woman of IoT" award, Diversity Best Practice's "Above and Beyond Legacy Award," and Michigan Council for Women in Technology's "Woman of the Year Award." Alison currently serves on the board of 8X8, where she is the compensation committee chair, and Zoominfo, as well as the Advisory Board of the Eli Broad College of Business at Michigan State University, her alma mater. Alison holds a BA in marketing from Michigan State University.
At Elastic, we see endless possibilities in a world of endless data. As CEO of Elastic, Ash Kulkarni's priority is to drive innovation, and he has the pleasure of working with the bright minds at Elastic to create products and solutions that use the power of search to help its customers and community turn possibilities into results. Ash joined Elastic as chief product officer in 2021 and prior to that held senior product leadership and management roles at McAfee, Akamai, Informatica, and Sun Microsystems. He and his family live in San Francisco and enjoy hiking, skiing, and exploring national parks in their free time.
At Elastic, we see endless possibilities in a world of endless data. As CEO of Elastic, Ash Kulkarni's priority is to drive innovation, and he has the pleasure of working with the bright minds at Elastic to create products and solutions that use the power of search to help its customers and community turn possibilities into results. Ash joined Elastic as chief product officer in 2021 and prior to that held senior product leadership and management roles at McAfee, Akamai, Informatica, and Sun Microsystems. He and his family live in San Francisco and enjoy hiking, skiing, and exploring national parks in their free time.
An orchestra is a team of musicians that has infinite opportunities to interpret and create music to inspire an audience. So too does Elastic's legal team work together to provide innovative and simple solutions to new and complex problems, enabling operational excellence and ease of business for our customers. This is my priority, and I am proud and privileged to lead this diverse and dispersed organization as we continue to learn, grow and thrive.
Prior to Elastic, I was the General Counsel at Arm Ltd. and held senior leadership roles at Symantec Corporation, which acquired AXENT Technologies, Inc. where I was General Counsel. Prior to this, I worked in the international development sector, both at a nonprofit and for the World Bank, in the Africa Department.
I have lived and worked in various places across the U.S. and in Europe. I have a J.D. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a B.A. from Washington University in St. Louis, MO.
Outside of the office, I love traveling, listening to music and exploring the arts, hiking with the dog and spending time with my family. I live in San Jose with my husband, two terrific kids, and our furry friends.
Caryn Marooney led global communications for Facebook and its family of apps including Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp, and Oculus. Prior to joining Facebook, Caryn co-founded OutCast Communications, one of Silicon Valley's premier technology communications firms. As co-founder, partner and CEO, Caryn was responsible for planning and executing communications strategies for companies of every size, including Amazon, Netflix, Salesforce, and VMware. Caryn was named multiple times to PRWeek's annual Power List, as one of the 50 most powerful people in public relations.
Caryn holds a BS degree from Cornell University.
Chetan Puttagunta joined Benchmark in 2018, after spending seven years at New Enterprise Associates, most recently as a general partner, where he focused on enterprise software, and currently serves as Elastic's Chairman of the Board and Lead Independent Director. His investments at NEA included MuleSoft, Elastic, MongoDB, Acquia, Reltio, Placester, Heap, Sentry, Swiftype, Forter, ScoutRFP, Canopy, and Folloze. He was previously involved with Gaikai (acquired by Sony). Prior to NEA, Chetan was an investor with H.I.G. Capital's Leveraged Buyout Group and a technology investment banker with Houlihan Lokey. He holds a BS degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University.
Job Titles:
- Chief Human Resources Officer
As the world looks for answers from all their data, Elastic is uniquely positioned to become a generational company. The innovative spirit that is characteristic of the Elastic brand is what allows Elasticians to thrive and grow and help customers deliver on the promise of technologies like Generative AI-today. I am excited to build on this strong foundation of care for technology, customers and people.
I have more than 20 years of HR experience, including leadership roles in IBM's consulting, industry platforms and blockchain businesses and the company's compensation and talent organizations. Most recently the vice president, Total Rewards at IBM, where I held global responsibility for the design and delivery of all compensation and benefits programs in addition to Corporate Health and Safety for their 300,000 employees. I have both a Bachelor's degree in International Relations and an MBA from Syracuse University.
I am originally from Syracuse, NY and now live in Austin, TX with my fiancé. I have always been interested in other countries and love to travel. I have two sisters who I am very close with and more than 20 cousins -- and with their partners and children, our annual family reunion is getting complicated!
Helping customers gain actionable insights from data is increasingly important in a world of ever-increasing volumes of data. At Elastic, I have the privilege of leading our cross-functional product teams. Nothing is more exciting than seeing engineering, product, and design teams working in rhythm to deliver great experiences for our customers. I am passionate about building customer-oriented solutions that balance flexibility and ease of use, and I don't believe customers should have to compromise for either.
I joined Elastic after three decades in various technology companies leading product and engineering teams. Most recently, I spent 16 years at Amazon Web Services (AWS), where I built and managed dozens of products used by millions of customers worldwide.
I hold a bachelor of science degree from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. My family and I live on the outskirts of Seattle, where we spend time with our pets, which include dogs, cats, chickens, goats, and alpacas. We love to travel but often find it hard to find a pet sitter.
At Elastic, our customers, our community, are at the heart of everything we do. Our passion for our users translates into their passion for Elastic. As Chief Revenue Officer, I'm responsible for the success of our customers, partners and the company by leading our teams in sales, customer success, services, solutions architecture, and partner engagement. I'm joining Elastic after 23 years at Cisco Systems, and prior to that, at IBM and SCANA Corporation. While at Cisco, I most recently focused on accelerating the company's transformation to recurring revenue. I had the opportunity to work with some of the largest strategic clients, spanning many vertical markets, including Global Financial Services, Manufacturing, Retail, Oil & Gas and Healthcare. I'm passionate about giving back and currently serve on the board of Covenant House International and the marketing advisory board for Clemson University's College of Business. Over the years, I've also served on various boards and committees for the American Heart Association, American Cancer Society, Boys & Girls Clubs, and the Cisco Foundation.
My wife and I have 2 amazing kids, and an adorable dog. For fun, I enjoy reading, golfing, watching college football and playing cards, and I am a graduate of Clemson University - Go Tigers!
As the technology landscape becomes increasingly complex, Elastic is uniquely positioned to help companies continue to innovate, even as they look to consolidate technology across the hybrid cloud. As the leader of the global marketing team, I have the privilege of engaging our customers, partners, and the community to share how we can make this a reality for them, all while driving exceptional experiences and outcomes.
I've spent the last 15 years managing marketing strategy and execution across a range of tech companies (Intel, McAfee, Symantec, Palo Alto Networks), with regional and global experience spanning all areas of marketing. I am passionately focused on demonstrating marketing's ability to be a strategic enabler for the business by leveraging data, innovation, and technology to deliver scalable growth.
I originally hail from the land down under (Australia, for those who missed the 'Men at Work' reference), but have been living in NYC for the last 10 years. When I'm not working, I love to read, travel, play tennis as well as cook (and eat) delicious food!
I've always been attracted to companies in the build stage, and Elastic has enjoyed great success to date, positioned at the forefront of Search AI. With tremendous product innovation and a large market opportunity ahead, I'm excited to contribute to the journey of creating the most trusted company in search, observability, and security for our customers.
As Elastic's Chief Financial Officer, I am responsible for Accounting, Strategic Finance, Internal Audit, and Investor Relations. Before joining Elastic, I was the CFO of Grammarly and HashiCorp. In addition to holding various finance leadership roles scaling technology companies, I've also held investment roles at Insight Venture Partners, American Capital Strategies, and Sierra Ventures.
I hold a bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Dartmouth College. I'm originally from Sri Lanka, and now call California my home, where I live with my wife and two kids. As a family, we love to travel and explore new places worldwide.
Paul Auvil brings more than 35 years of finance, technology, and corporate leadership experience to the Elastic Board of Directors. He served as the Chief Financial Officer of Proofpoint, Inc., a provider of security-as-a-service solutions from March 2007 until March 2023. From September 2006 to March 2007, he was an entrepreneur-in-residence at Benchmark Capital, a venture capital firm. From August 2002 to July 2006, he served as the Chief Financial Officer at VMware, Inc., a computing virtualization company. In addition to serving on Elastic's board, he currently serves on the board of Cerebras, Chainalysis, and Modern Treasury.
Paul has previously served on the Boards of One Medical, OpenTV, Marin Software, and Quantum Corporation. He earned a BS in Electrical Engineering from Dartmouth College and a Master of Management degree from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.
My focus and passion are all about the customer, ensuring both successful adoption of our solutions and a great experience with Elastic. In order to achieve this, we need strong career development for our people and technology to ensure we can scale to support our growth. If we look through the eyes of our customers it will ensure we provide a better experience. That is why the customer journey is at the core of how we operate. At Elastic, I lead our customer success group (CSG) which encompasses our customer success team, training teams, services teams, and support organization. My priority is to ensure that we have a comprehensive and cohesive strategy for all touchpoints that a customer makes with Elastic throughout their journey.
Prior to Elastic, I was the senior vice president of Services and Support for MuleSoft, a Salesforce company, for five years. Prior to Mulesoft, I served as global vice president of Services and Customer Success at Splunk. I also spent 15 years at BMC Software leading worldwide services and various other Geo level roles for Services and PreSales. I have also served as an advisor/coach to companies like Opower and other organizations over the past 20 years.
I'm originally from Queensland, Australia, and hold a degree in Business and Information Technology from Central Queensland University. Currently, I live in Texas with my wife and three children where I enjoy cycling, swimming, traveling, and giving back to the community.
As a founder of Elastic and CTO, Shay Banon has been fascinated with search ever since he tried to build a recipe app for his wife in 2004, a journey that led to him writing the first few lines of code of Elasticsearch in 2009 and later founding Elastic in 2012. Shay believes finding beauty and excelling is a combination of perspective and grit. As someone who got into computers by counting the number of job postings in the newspaper, he loves building things-a product, a community, or a company and the process of acquiring the knowledge to do so.
Job Titles:
- Corporate Director
- Technology Advisor, Director
Shelley Leibowitz is a prominent technology advisor, director, and thought leader. She has spent her career at the intersection of financial services and technology, with both private sector and public sector experience. After more than two decades of Chief Information Officer roles at top tier financial services companies, she served as Group-wide Chief Information Officer for the World Bank.
Shelley is a seasoned corporate director and in addition to Elastic, she currently serves on the boards of Morgan Stanley and several privately held companies in the fintech and information security arenas. She also advises companies in areas of digital transformation, IT portfolio and risk management, information security and digital trust, performance metrics, and effective governance.
She is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations, on the NY Board of the National Association of Corporate Directors, and on the CNAS Council, a not-for-profit that runs service and learning programs in urban high schools across the country.
Sohaib Abbasi previously served as the CEO and President of Informatica Corporation, where he led the company to five-fold growth and established leadership in multiple software categories, including data integration, data quality, master data management, and cloud data integration.
Prior to Informatica, Sohaib was the Senior Vice President of the Oracle Tools Division and Oracle Education at Oracle Corporation. Sohaib joined Oracle in 1982 when it was a 30-person startup and was instrumental in growing the business from $4M to more than $9B in annual revenue. He also envisioned and launched the Oracle Tools business, which he grew from zero to $3.75B in cumulative license revenues.
In addition to serving on Elastic's board, he currently serves as a member of the board of Udemy, Inc., an online global learning platform. He also serves as a Senior Advisor at TPG (Texas Pacific Group), and Balderton Capital UK. He previously served on the boards of directors of Peakon, Nutanix, McAfee, New Relic, Informatica, and Red Hat. In 2010, Sohaib received the Chairman of the Year Award from the American Business Awards®.
Sohaib has more than 30 years of enterprise technology leadership experience and was previously ranked second in Bloomberg's list of all-time business turnaround CEOs in technology. Additionally, Glassdoor ranked him as one of the five best CEOs to work for in the enterprise software industry.
Sohaib graduated with honors from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he earned both a BS and MS in Computer Science.
Steven Schuurman was one of the four co-founders of Elastic, serving as Chief Executive Officer for the first five years of the company. Previously, Steven was Chief Executive Officer of Orange11, which was acquired by Trifork A/S (TRIFOR.CO). In addition, he co-founded the internationally renowned open source software vendor SpringSource, one of the most successful open source companies at the time, prior to its acquisition by VMware (VMW) in 2009.