TLDR: Sumit Dhawan, former President of VMware joins Proofpoint as new CEO a day after Broadcom announces Layoffs at newly acquired VMware. Unemployed sales people in tech, good luck. Competitors > take advantage
On Nov 28th, 2023 Proofpoint announces the hiring of their new CEO Sumit Dhawan. Dhawan comes with years of experience in the tech space as former President, Chief Customer Officer, SVP at VMware. Additionally CEO of Instart. Dhawan played a pivotal role in helping both lead to successful exits. VMware purchased by Broadcom (formerly Symantec) as well as Instart acquired by Akamai.
The Proofpoint board of directors states they are excited to partner with Sumit as he is here to usher in a new stage of growth. “Sumit brings a wealth of valuable experience and expertise in building category-leading, scaled companies and businesses. We are confident his customer-centric passion and strong legacy of leadership will continue to carry Proofpoint’s mission forward in providing people-centric cybersecurity solutions that address some of the most challenging risks facing organizations today.”
While this is exciting news for Proofpoint, CRN magazine shared news yesterday of VMware layoffs occurring after their acquisition by Broadcom. VMware with over 10,000 employees being brought into the Broadcom family are now at risk of being cut before the holidays kick off.
“It’s a combination of disgust and disappointment” one VMware employee stated on Monday. As the Pipeline Press team has reached out to directors and executives at both Broadcom and VMware, no comment was the only response provided.
Further the partners that do work with the VMware sales team are left in the dark on where things are going. CRN reports that partners see no benefit and they are lost as to who to reach out to. From an outside perspective it seems this is news not only to employees but partners as well.
Similar to how Broadcom handled the Symantec acquisition, customers are concerned about price increases as well as being ignored unless they are of a certain price tier.
Now Sumit Dhawan, just at VMware is now CEO of Proofpoint. The only question left is what impact will this have for Proofpoint employees and their partners?
Impact to Sales People?
Here is our take on what it means for you dirty sales people – the job market in the tech space is about to get a lot more crowded. Beef up your resume and differentiate yourself if you are in the hunt for a new role.
If you are employed at a firm that competes with VMware this is great news, Broadcom typically leads their smaller customers to feel left in the cold – reflect on the Symantec acquisition – and this could be a great talking point to grab 2024 budgets.
As noted above, channel reps and partners are left in the dark on who to contact, which means their end of year deals may be stalled/pushed to Q1.
