Fast-growing cloud data management, backup and disaster recovery company Rubrik has a new VP of worldwide channel. Bertrand Yansouni will take on the role, having recently left a similar position at Google Cloud. Yansouni reports to Mark Smith, EVP of global sales and business development. Randy Schirman, who previously held the position, will focus on the company’s MSP business.
Rubrik competes in multiple sectors: Backup and recovery, disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS), data archiving and more. The company claims to protect customers from ransomware, while offering "near zero" recovery times from disasters. Rubrik's annual revenue run rate was approaching $100 million as of May 2017, at which time the company raised $180 million at a $1.3 billion valuation. We don't know current revenues, nor do we know the firm's cash burn rate.
In many ways, Rubrik is attempting to disrupt entrenched data backup specialists across hybrid clouds. But at some point the company may also run head-on into fast-growth rivals like Druva. along with Veeam (approaching $1 billion in annual revenues) and Datto (competing in the MSP-centric SMB sector).
Who Is Bertrand Yansouni?
Yansouni will lead Rubrik's channel charge against those and other rivals. Until recently, he was the VP of global partner sales and strategic partnerships for Google Cloud. While there he oversaw the go-to-market partner ecosystem for 13,000 partners and led a business unit that achieved 300 percent year-over-year growth.
Previous to that, Yansouni led Cloudera’s partner program. Yansouni also held channel leadership roles at Riverbed and VMware. In fact, it was his former boss at VMware, Diana Greene -- who heads up Google’s cloud division -- that recruited him to Google.
While there, he was tasked with expanding the company’s partner system to rival Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Yansouni wasn’t at Google for very long though, exiting the position less than a year after taking on the role.
New Role
Yansouni will take on a similar role at Rubrik, the company said, developing and leading the global vision and strategy for channel partners, including value added resellers (VARs), distributors, and solution providers.
“Bertrand’s 25 years of experience building high-performing channel organizations is a big win for Rubrik, our partners, and customers,” said Bipul Sinha, Co-founder and CEO, Rubrik.
Rubrik has been heavily focused on the channel, recently launching its Service Delivery partner program. The program caters to MSPs, VARs, and consulting partners and was designed to create premium service offerings and new revenue streams for partners.
Additional insights from Joe Panettieri.
