Vyatta Appoints Kelly Herrell as CEO; Open-Source Veteran Takes the Helm to Guide Vyatta Into Next Phase of Growth.SAN MATEO San Mateo (săn mətā`ō), city (1990 pop. 85,486), San Mateo co., W Calif., on San Francisco Bay; inc. 1894. It is a commercial and retail center with some high-technology manufacturing. San Mateo, Spanish for St. , Calif. -- Vyatta today announced it has named Kelly Herrell Chief Executive Officer. As CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. and member of the board of directors, Herrell will provide the vision and strategic leadership for Vyatta, and drive the company to its goal of global leadership in commercial-grade open-source networking products. With a proven track record for growing companies in the open source and networking industries, Herrell will work closely with company founder, Allen Leinwand, who remains in his current role as chairman. Herrell joined Vyatta from MontaVista Software MontaVista Software develops systems software, development tools and Embedded Linux-based software targeting embedded systems such as automotive electronics, communications equipment, and television set-top boxes and other connected devices and infrastructure. where he was the senior vice president of strategic operations at the world's pre-eminent embedded Linux The Linux operating system configured and enhanced to work in a wide variety of applications, including handheld devices, network appliances, industrial machines and consumer electronics devices. The modularity of the Linux kernel makes it well suited to embedded systems. supplier. At MontaVista, Herrell led the strategic focus into telecommunications equipment and mobile phones; today network operators around the world use MontaVista Linux in their network infrastructure as well as in tens of millions of mobile terminals. Prior to joining MontaVista, Kelly was vice president of marketing for Cobalt Networks Cobalt Networks was a maker of low-cost servers based on Linux. Founded in 1996 in Mountain View, California under the name Cobalt Microserver, the company pioneered easy to use server appliances featuring secure web user interfaces for Internet service providers (ISPs) , the dominant provider of open source-based server appliances for web hosting Making a Web site available on the Internet. Many ISPs host a few personal Web pages for an individual at no additional cost above the monthly service fee, but the address is subordinate to the ISP; for example, www.friendlyisp.com/pat_smith. . He helped drive company growth through an explosive IPO (Initial Public Offering) The first time a company offers shares of stock to the public. While not a computer term per se, many founders, employees and insiders of computer companies have found this acronym more exciting than any tech term they ever heard. , and played a key role in facilitating Cobalt's successful $2.3 billion merger with Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ: JAVA[3]) is an American vendor of computers, computer components, computer software, and information-technology services, founded on 24 February 1982. . Herrell has also held executive and management positions at CacheFlow, Oracle, Teradata, NCR (NCR Corporation, Dayton, OH, www.ncr.com) A technology company specializing in financial terminal transactions, retail systems and data warehousing. Until the late 1990s, NCR was heavily invested in the hardware side of the industry, known worldwide as a major manufacturer of computers , and AT&T. "Vyatta has crafted the rarest of opportunities -- to deliver a large and lasting impact on the multibillion-dollar network products industry," said Herrell. "Over the past decade, proprietary networking products have stagnated. During the same period, open networking components such as Linux and others have blossomed. These conditions make the networking industry ripe for disruption by open source-based products. I look forward to building on the momentum the company has today, taking Vyatta to its next stage of growth, and helping to positively affect the future of the networking industry by offering a flexible, highly functional, and open alternative." "Kelly has a rare combination of open-source and networking experience, along with an entrepreneurial spirit that makes him a natural fit at an emerging company like Vyatta," said Allen Leinwand, Vyatta founder and chairman. "As founder, I have tremendous pride in the company we have built and the thriving open-source networking community that we've fostered. I'm confident in Kelly's leadership and expertise and look forward to teaming with him as we bring our products and services to market and continue on our growth path." Vyatta is developing the Open Flexible Router (OFR Ofr Oberfranken (German) OFR Operating and Financial Review OFR Office of the Federal Register (US NARA) OFr Old French (linguistics) OFR Optics for Research ), a flexible, cost-effective, and secure alternative to the incumbent, closed-source solutions that dominate the market today. The company has cultivated a community that brings together users and developers to shape the product and advance the cause of open-source networking. A beta version of the Vyatta OFR is currently available for download. For more information on Vyatta, or to join the Vyatta community and participate in building the first open, flexible router, go to www.vyatta.com. About Vyatta "Vyatta" is the ancient Sanskrit word meaning "open" -- a fitting name for a company that was created to bring commercial-quality, open-source networking products to market. Open source has created a profound change in the market place, shifting the balance of power from large corporations back to the users of products. Open source is about cost savings, increased flexibility and choice, and better security. Vyatta is bringing those qualities to the world of network infrastructure products. |
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