IT systems management software provider Quest Software continues to overhaul its executive suite. Less than a month after Quest hired Corel veteran Patrick Nichols as CEO, the firm has hired three new CXOs. They are:
- MobileIron & CA Technologies veteran Greg Randolph as chief revenue officer (CRO);
- Vista Consulting Group, Epicor & Dell Software veteran Colleen Langevin as chief marketing officer (CMO); and
- Aspect Software veteran Chris DeBiase as chief operations officer (COO).
In a prepared statement about the hires, Nichols said:
“It’s an exciting time for Quest and with this new leadership team, we are in a great position to become a global powerhouse in the industry. Greg’s proven track record as a successful global enterprise sales leader, Colleen’s deep experience in building and executing successful go-to-market campaigns for B2B software companies, and Chris’s strong data analytics and business operations management capabilities tee us up for global success and growth, and allow us to deliver a larger offering to our customers to support their growth.”
Quest Software: Enterprise Strength, MSP Challenges
Quest's software portfolio includes database management, data protection, identity and access management, Microsoft platform management and unified endpoint management. Quest is widely used within Fortune 500 companies, but a move down-market to small business MSPs stalled when Dell Technologies acquired the business back in 2012.
Dell ultimately sold Quest Software in 2016 to Francisco Partners and Elliott Management Group. The move helped Dell to strengthen its balance sheet for the massive EMC buyout that year. Quest's CEO lineup since that ownership change has included Jeff Hawn (2016-2019), Mike Kohlsdorf (2019-2020) and now Nichols.
Quest attempted to jumpstart its MSP partner engagements in 2019 -- promoting backup and disaster recovery (BDR) solutions into the managed services sector. The MSP push, at the time, included QoreStor deduplication software-defined secondary storage for disaster recovery; NetVault Backup for enterprise data protection, Foglight for Virtualization, and Rapid Recovery.
Quest Software: Competition, Next Moves
Still, BDR for MSPs is a crowded market with strong, entrenched rivals. Key names to know include Acronis, Axcient, Datto, MSP360, OpenText's Carbonite, and Veeam, among many others. Quest also faces competition in the enterprise from Veeam and upstarts like Cohesity and Rubrik.
June 2020 will mark four years since Quest shifted to private equity ownership. What surprises do Nichols and the new CXO team members have planned for channel partners? We'll be listening closely...
