Interop is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them. Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

IT Automation Strategy Speakers

Mark Settle | 7x CIO

Mark Settle is a seven time CIO, three time CIO 100 award winner and two time book author. His most recent book is "Truth from the Valley, A Practical Primer on IT Management for the Next Decade". Settle serves on the advisory boards of several venture capital firms and multiple startup companies. Seven members of his prior management teams are currently sitting CIOs within publicly traded companies.  

Marshall Bartoszek | EVP, Chief Value Officer, Orchestral.ai

Marshall Bartoszek is an executive, entrepreneur and trusted advisor with an experienced perspective on the evolution of data center, cloud and networking businesses over the last 25 years.

As a thought leader and change agent he excels at helping enterprise leaders address key business challenges by connecting the dots that link emerging technologies with their related value drivers, cost implications and potential business impact.

As Orchestral.ai's Chief Value Officer, Marshall engages with some of the world’s largest organizations in ongoing conversations that address the challenges of digital transformation and the role that IT automation, workflow orchestration and artificial intelligence play in improving business performance.

His frequent references to "Autonomous Infrastructure" paints a picture of next-generation IT infrastructure that is AIOps-driven with pro-active incident avoidance, root-cause alerting and cost optimizations that finally alleviate the stress that infrastructure & operations teams have lived with for far too long.

Joan Goodchild | Editor, Dark Reading

Joan Goodchild is a veteran journalist, editor, and writer who has been covering security for more than a decade. She has written for several publications and previously served as editor-in-chief for CSO Online.

Chris Morales | CISO and Head of Security Strategy, Netenrich

One of the industry’s finest, Chris Morales, oversees the company’s security vision and strategy as Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and Head of Security Strategy. He’s well known and respected in security circles as an innovative leader and technical expert. Throughout his career, he has advised and designed incident response and threat management programs for some of the world’s largest enterprises. Chris most recently led advisory services and security analytics at Vectra AI. He has also held roles in cybersecurity engineering, consulting, sales and research at companies including HyTrust, NSS Labs, 451 Research, Accuvant, McAfee and IBM.

Chris Crowley | Consultant, Montance® LLC

Christopher Crowley has 20 years of experience managing and securing networks, beginning with his first job as an Ultrix and VMS systems administrator at 15 years old. Today, Crowley is a Senior Instructor at the SANS Institute and the course author for SOC-Class.com: the culmination of his thoughts on effective cybersecurity operations. He works with a variety of organizations across industries providing cybersecurity technical analysis, developing and publishing research, sharing expert security insights at conferences, and chairing security operations events. He has provided training to thousands of students globally.

Eric Parizo | Principal Analyst, Security Operations, Omdia

Eric Parizo supports Omdia's Cybersecurity Accelerator research practice, guiding vendor, service provider, and enterprise clients. He provides thought-leading analysis and contributes to custom research. His specializations include enterprise security operations (SecOps) and enterprise infrastructure security technology, with a focus on enterprise network security and security architecture integration.

Eric has been covering, researching, or speaking on topics related to enterprise information technology for approximately 20 years.

Prior to joining Omdia (formerly Ovum) in 2019, Eric spent four years at GlobalData, where he was responsible for tracking and analyzing the enterprise network security product segment as well as the top-tier enterprise security vendor technology and strategy.

Eric previously spent approximately 15 years as a technology journalist and a multimedia editor at leading B2B publisher, TechTarget, most recently serving as executive editor for the Security Media Group. He is a nine-time ASBPE award winner, the B2B publishing industry's most prestigious award for excellence.

Brad Shimmin | Chief Analyst, AI & Data Analytics, Omdia

Brad Shimmin has more than 25 years of experience in IT technology, analyzing data and information architectures. He is skilled in competitive market intelligence, technology selection, business development, and quantitative research. He also has experience as an IT professional, business analyst, book author/editor, and high-tech journalist/editor.

Brad helps enterprises and high-tech companies work effectively across several market areas, including enterprise data and analytics, artificial intelligence, digital transformation, and DevOps. His expertise also covers market evaluation and go-to-market messaging, and he has a background in software development and database administration.

Rachel Brennan | VP of Product Marketing, Bizagi

Rachel Brennan is a BPM Industry thought leader with over 20 years of experience evangelizing BPM solutions globally. Rachel’s education and experience enable her to teach technical concepts in a way that is both entertaining and easy to understand whether you are a business leader or a developer.

Nick Colisto | VP and CIO, Avery Dennison

In his role, Mr. Colisto is responsible for driving and executing an enterprise IT strategy for the company, including shepherding the overall company strategy with respect to information technology trends, driving efficiencies across the organization, improving delivery of IT services and products to the business, and building on our existing culture of operational excellence.

Prior to joining Avery Dennison, Mr. Colisto served as senior vice president and chief information officer for leading global water technology company, Xylem Inc. He has also held senior IT roles with K. Hovnanian Companies, one of the U.S.’ largest homebuilders, and Boehringer-Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, a global, research-driven pharmaceutical company.

Mr. Colisto holds a BBA degree in management information systems and a Masters in information systems from Pace University.

Scott Howitt | Senior VP, CIO, McAfee

Scott Howitt is Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) at McAfee. He is responsible for McAfee’s corporate systems, leading the Information Security and IT organizations, and for driving the company’s cloud transformation. Alignment of technology to company strategy, partnerships with product and sales teams to ignite innovation, and positive customer experiences are guiding principles on which Scott and his teams focus.

Scott joined McAfee from MGM Resorts International, where he served as Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and CIO while leading the information security and privacy program for all 27 resorts worldwide. Prior to MGM Resorts, his leadership journey included executive roles at JCPenney, Alliance Data, and Electronic Data Systems (EDS). He was also a Commissioner on Nevada’s DHS Cyber Security Commission and was a founding member and served on the Board of the Retail and Hospitality ISAC.

Scott earned his B.A. in Physics from the University of Texas and attained his CISSP in 2005. In his free time, Scott is a voracious reader and avid hiker, and he enjoys spending time with his wife and three daughters.

Cassandra Mooshian | Senior Analyst, RPA & Intelligent Automation, Omdia

With coverage areas including robotic process automation (RPA), intelligent automation, and AI, Cassandra Mooshian produces thought-provoking research for vendor, service provider, and enterprise clients. Although she roots her analysis in data, Cassandra provides value-added insight to translate the data into what it means for these clients.

Cassandra joined Omdia (formerly Ovum) in 2019, having spent the 10 years prior in technology and market research at Technology Business Research, Inc. (TBR). At TBR, Cassandra covered topics including the all-encompassing cloud, professional services, hybrid IT, and enterprise software. She led end-user research and spearheaded many reports, benchmarks, and market forecasts.

Jayne Groll | CEO, DevOps Institute

Jayne Groll is a co-founder and Board Member of the DevOps Institute (DOI). She is also President of ITSM Academy. Jayne carries many IT credentials including ITIL Expert™, Certified ScrumMaster, Certified Agile Service Manager, DevOps Foundation and is a Certified Process Design Engineer (CPDE)™. Her IT management career spans over 25years in roles across a wide range of industries. Jayne is very active in the ITSM, Agile and DevOps communities and is the author of the Agile Service Management Guide. She is a frequent presenter at local, national and virtual events.

Glenn Sullivan | Principal Product Manager, Infoblox

Glenn joined the Infoblox team when SnapRoute, a company he co-founded in 2015, was acquired by Infoblox. At SnapRoute, Sullivan was responsible for product direction by advocating for the end-user. Prior to founding SnapRoute, Sullivan was responsible for building out hyperscale data center environments at Apple. In addition to core network operational functions, Sullivan led efforts to automate the lifecycle management of various platforms in a multivendor environment. Before Apple, Sullivan was a specialist support engineer on the LAN Switching team in Cisco TAC. While there, his specialty was in turning around customer sentiment by focusing on escalated issues and transforming the customer experience into a positive one. Sullivan has a BS in Network and Systems Administration from RIT (Rochester Institute of Technology).

Cheryl Razzell | VP of Engineering, Polystream

Cheryl Razzell is a world-class technical leader with over 20+ years of experience in driving business value via technology. A seasoned public speaker, a digital disruptor, and a mentor & advocate for women in tech, Cheryl helps organisations implement a DevOps working practice.Able to drive business change management and business transformation agendas, Cheryl delivers digital service transition, ‘best in class’ technical services, technology upgrades & systems migration. She's also an experienced departmental leader, able to engage with business stakeholders, executives and 3rd parties to drive ambitious technology strategies & roadmaps, aligned to core business needs.Across her career, she's brought her energy and expertise to companies like Apple, BBC, News International, and Yammer (later sold to Microsoft for $1.2BN). Now, she's the VP of Engineering at Polystream - a cloud-technology company powering a new era of cloud-native experiences.

Roy Illsley | Chief Analyst, IT Ecosystem & Operations, Omdia

Roy Illsley's key areas of research include cloud computing, cloud-native technologies, IT strategy, IT operational management, and data center technologies. He also advises on quantum computing, automation, virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), and workspaces. Roy uses his extensive experience combined with Omdia’s surveys and market data to understand how technologies will add benefit to businesses.

He works in the enterprise team and has over 40 years’ experience in the IT sector working for a variety of consultancy and end-user companies with experience in defense, utilities, automotive, retail, and fast-moving consumer goods industries. He joined Butler Group as a senior analyst in January 2004. Roy has worked on many major report projects, white papers, and primary research. He also delivers keynote speeches globally. He has a Bachelor of Science (Hons.) in electronic engineering and telecommunications, an MBA, and is a Member of the Institute of Engineering Technology (MIET) that holds the registered status of a Chartered Engineer (CEng).

Troy Whitney | VP, Transformation & Solutions, Network to Code

Troy Whitney is the Vice President of Transformation & Solutions at Network to Code. Troy joined Network to Code with a passion to help enterprise customers adopt change. His 20-year career includes clients in the large retail, banking, healthcare and government service industries. He offers a unique mix of technical savvy and practical people skills to help teams explore the art of what’s possible with advanced network automation.

Prior to Network to Code, Troy held leadership positions with two Silicon Valley startups - ThousandEyes and Samsara, spent several years in technical sales as a CCIE at Cisco Systems, and was an avionics design and flight test engineer for the Aircraft Operations Division at NASA.

Bryan Culver | Managing Consultant, Network to Code

Bryan Culver is a Managing Consultant at Network to Code. He leads team members on enterprise consulting engagements, helping transform their organizations to think network automation first. Hailing from the “Mitten State” you can often find him pointing to his hand anytime someone asks where he lives. He’s been developing software for 15+ years, a polyglot of programming languages, and enjoys solving physical, virtual, and non-technical networking challenges. When he’s not deep into the matrix, he spends his time between his family of five, power tools in hand, and listing to copious amounts of podcasts.

Michael Bushong | VP, Cloud Ready Data Center, Juniper Networks

Mike is currently responsible for Juniper’s data center business, both hardware and software, across all market segments. In this role, Mike has direct responsibility over areas like hardware and software, underlays and overlays, disaggregation, data center operations, SDN, telco cloud, and a number of supporting technologies. Having spent most of his career managing product and strategy at Juniper, Plexxi, and Brocade, Mike has played leading roles in incubating industry efforts around automation, DevOps, SDN, and NFV. At Plexxi, Mike led efforts to drive SDN-based control over optically-interconnected data center solutions. At Brocade, Mike ran the data center business, leading the strategy that drove the acquisition of event-driven infrastructure company StackStorm. He also ran the software business, leading Vyatta and OpenDaylight efforts to drive uCPE, SD-WAN, and SDN controller efforts.

Ivan Pepelnjak | Independent Network Architect, Author, 30-year Veteran of the Networking Industry, IPSpace

Ivan Pepelnjak, CCIE#1354 Emeritus, has been designing and implementing large-scale service provider and enterprise networks as well as teaching and writing books about advanced technologies since 1990.

He’s author of several Cisco Press books, prolific blogger and writer, occasional consultant, and author of a series of highly successful webinars and online courses.

His current focus includes network automation, networking in public clouds, large-scale data centers, and software defined networking (SDN) and data centers (SDDC).

Joe Eldridge | Engineering Manager, Riot Games

Joe Eldridge is an Engineering Manager at Riot Games. He currently supports the team which builds and operates Riot's global backbone. He's been leading teams for 20+ years and an advocate of leading with intent and servant leadership. He spends his time playing video games, painting miniatures, and chasing after his retired racing Greyhound when not working. Before Riot, he worked at Cox Communications, leading the voice operations team supporting residential and business services.

Brett Lykins | Managing Consultant, Network to Code

Brett Lykins is a Managing Consultant at Network to Code. He has been in the networking field since 2007, with stints in the enterprise, ISP, and hosting industries. Brett has a passion for helping businesses achieve success through innovative technologies, network automation, and process improvement.

Doug Gourlay | VP and GM for Software, Arista Networks

Douglas Gourlay is the Vice President and General Manager for Software at Arista Networks.  In this role he leads the development of network automation and continuous integration pipeline systems, cloud routing and connectivity, network observability, and product security. Gourlay has served at Arista in a variety of roles from leading marketing, product management, and systems engineering and led the initial development of popular products such as CloudVision, VM Tracer, Virtual EOS, and early implementations of declaratively provisioned intent-based networking models.  Gourlay joined Arista in 2009 from Cisco Systems where he led the product management and marketing for Cisco's data center division including the initial development of the Nexus family of data center switches, NX-OS, the CatOS to Native IOS migration, and 802.1X authentication.

Samir Parikh | Head of Product, Intentionet

Samir Parikh is the Head of Product at Intentionet. He has more than 15 years of product management and engineering experience in the networking and telecommunications industry.

Prior to Intentionet, he was Vice President, Product Management at Gainspeed, Inc (a venture-backed startup acquired by Nokia in July 2016). During his tenure at Gainspeed, Samir was responsible for product management and marketing for the Gainspeed Virtual CCAP solution.

Prior to Gainspeed, he was Director, Product Management for the Carrier Routing System (CRS) product line at Cisco. In this role, Samir was responsible for the corporate strategy for the service provider core routing market. During his tenure at Cisco Systems, he also served as Software Engineer, Product Manager and Product Line Manager in Cisco Service Provider Routing Technology Group.

Samir holds a B.S in Computer Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Michael Wynston | Director, Global Network Architecture, Fiserv

Experienced leader in Network Infrastructure in Financial Services for over 25 years. Highly skilled at leading and managing teams in Infrastructure through complex globally scaled projects. Using agile management methods, Michael has led transformations of IT Infrastructure at multiple Fortune 100 Financial Services organizations.

Currently leading Global Network Architecture services with his team in AMER, LAC, APAC, and EMEA developing new infrastructure focused on leveraging leading edge technologies to provide our business with the ability to scale faster and with cost efficiencies.