Stefaan Vervaet
Stefaan Vervaet is a seasoned product & marketing leader with extensive experience in running high performing teams, driving business growth through product marketing, and executing go-to-market strategies in the software and hardware industries.
With over 18 years of experience in B2B, distributed file and object software systems, private cloud, and video security architectures, Stefaan excels in bringing emerging software and hardware technologies to the edge or enterprise markets.
He played pivotal roles in two early-stage startups that were successfully acquired by Symantec/Veritas and Western Digital, contributing significantly to the growth and success of the businesses post-acquisition.
His achievements include building and scaling two startups in the cloud & backup industry to successful acquisitions by Fortune 500 companies, achieving over $100M in run rate.
As a skilled mini-GM, Stefaan increased margin dollars in the $2B+ video security market by 4%+ through effective pricing, marketing, and optimized product strategies, attaining a market share of over 45%.
Through his expertise in marketing, Stefaan generated over 1,000 new customer leads via campaigns, partner webinars, thought leadership blogs, and key presentations at major industry conferences, showcasing his solutions-based storytelling approach.
He successfully launched three major product lines in cloud storage and video security, boosting market share by 5%+ in key strategic accounts by prioritizing unique and sticky product features.
Stefaan is adept at defining and driving long-term planning for a $2B+ portfolio, focusing on increasing margin and revenue while supporting new emerging AI workloads in edge cameras and compute servers.
Apart from his professional endeavors, Stefaan is dedicated to promoting diversity and inclusion, serving as the LGBTQ+ business resource group leader at Western Digital, where he initiated campaigns and fundraising for organizations like the Trevor Project.
He is also an advocate for autonomous and decentralized storage and compute solutions, serving as an Ambassador for ThreeFold, a blockchain-enabled grid owned by everyone, everywhere.
Stefaan's skills encompass a wide range of areas including product marketing, strategic planning, analyst and press relationship building, product positioning, P&L management, and sales enablement, among others.
He holds a Master's degree in Applied Information Technology from Ghent University and has held key positions in organizations like Protocol Labs, Western Digital, AmpliData, and Veritas Software.
