Lynch, who was brought on board as CEO of then independent Vertica Systems in 2010, is largely credited with turning around the struggling organization’s sales & marketing operations and significantly boosting employee morale following the tumultuous tenure of his successor, Vertica founder Mike Stonebreaker.
Chris Lynch leaving HP is a big loss for the company. Lynch is now freely roaming the big data badlands and this will really put some wind in the sales of the startup scene in Boston.
Since it’s founding in 2005, industry insiders agreed that Vertica’s big data solution was among the best on the market, but business lagged due in part to poor sales, marketing, and operations. The company’s fortunes changed dramatically after Lynch came on board, culminating in topping the Big Data pure-play market with $84 million in revenue in 2011, beating out the likes of EMC Greenplum and Teradata Aster Data. Vertica’s customer roster reads like a Who’s Who of Web 2.0 titans and includes Twitter, Zynga, AOL and Groupon.
Lynch told his staff during the February meeting that he has no intention of retiring. Indeed, he pledged to his staff that he would assist in starting-up or otherwise supporting no less than 20 Big Data start-ups in the Boston area over the next five years.
As for Lynch, he is a startup rock star on the east coast and many expect that he will do something in the Big Data applications area.
Prior to joining Vertica, Lynch served as President and CEO of Acopia Networks, which was acquired by F5 Communications in 2007. He was also head of sales for ArrowPoint Communications, which sold to Cisco for $5.7B.
Chuck Smith, Vertica’s Corporate Communications Manager said, “I’ve worked with Chris Lynch for a number of years (and companies), and simply stated, Chris is the type of CEO who puts everything on the line for his employees, customers, and partners day-in and day-out.”
Chris Lynch should ignite the startup scene in Boston.
Lynch recently delivered a motivating commencement speech at Bentley College in Boston.
Of course another motivating video similar to Lynch was the famous now historic commencement from Steve Jobs.
