Violin adds Pure sales heft to bow with strings of new senior folk

In what almost looks like a tit-for-tat exercise, Violin Memory has gone and raided Pure Storage’s sales exec cupboard to recruit Carlo Wolf as VP sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Wolf was formerly regional director of central Europe for Pure Storage, which has just IPO’d.

Ironically, Violin’s former VP EMEA, Christian Putz, went to Pure in February to run its EMEA sales operation as regional director.

Previously Vince Blackhall, who ran EMEA sales for Violin before Putz, went to Pure as well. He lasted 16 months before moving to Kaminario as its director for EMEA channel sales in August this year.

Violin's worldwide sales head Said Ouissal, SVP for field operations, has also hired Magnus Almquist, who steps into the role of Violin’s vice president of sales for Asia Pacific, Latin America and emerging markets.

We’re told Wolf spent 18 years at Cisco where he was managing director for Germany, and grew the technology business revenue to over $1bn, leading 1,000 employees and building one of the strongest partner networks in the region. Violin would sure like that replicated.

Carlo Wolf (left) and Marcus Almquist (right)

Almquist was formerly VP worldwide sales leader at a cybersecurity startup. He has worked at startups, medium-sized and Fortune 500 companies, including Ericsson and Redback Networks.

Violin, suffering from reduced revenues, needs to raise sales so it drives revenue up and, hopefully, its share price follows in step.

Separately, Nimble Storage has hired Janet Matsuda as its chief marketing officer. She comes from Blue Coat. Dan Leary, who was Nimble’s VP for marketing, moves sort of sideways to be VP Products, Solutions and Alliances, retaining a technology and product-focused role. ®