Extreme Networks
Reconnex brings a wealth of management talent and experience to its thought leadership effort. Read the biographies and perspectives of senior management who provide valuable expertise and insights.
John K. Peters, CEO
Dr. Ratinder Paul Singh Ahuja, CTO
Faizel Lakhani, Vice President of Products and Marketing
Kuldeep Sandhu, Vice President of Engineering
Gary Taggart, Vice President of Sales
Allan Thompson, Vice President of Business Development
John K. Peters
CEO
John Peters, chief executive officer of Reconnex, has built a distinguished executive management career in Silicon Valley. As CEO he is responsible for the leadership, strategic direction and successful growth of the company and its employees. Mr. Peters has been CEO of several venture capital backed companies including PocketThis, an application software provider to mobile carriers; Yipes Enterprise Services, an enterprise-focused provider of Ethernet network services within and between cities; Netli, a software-intensive network service business; and Sigma Networks, a provider of broadband metropolitan area services. Prior to Sigma Networks, Peters was executive vice president for Concentric Network Corporation where he held various senior management roles leading the operations, engineering, product development, product management, Web hosting services, and corporate development organizations.
Peters has also served as president of Venture Development Consulting, specializing in new communications and information services; vice president and chief operating officer of Pacific Bell Information Services, Inc.; vice president of application services for Telestream Corporation; co-founder of Integrated Office Systems, Inc., a communications and information systems company; and vice president of advanced network services for GTE Telenet Communications Corporation.
Peters has an M.B.A. from Stanford Graduate School of Business and a B.S. degree in statistics from Stanford University.[Top]
Dr. Ratinder Paul Singh Ahuja
CTO
As chief technical officer (CTO), Dr. Ratinder Paul Singh Ahuja brings his technical expertise of building scalable, high-performance network-based hardware appliances to Reconnex. He is responsible for the overall products, services and support strategy of the company. Ahuja believes in creating value by facilitating the development of technology that originates from the needs of the customer. Dr. Ahuja's unique ability to translate customer needs into technology is the centerpiece of the corporate strategies which will enable the success of Reconnex and its customers.
Prior to Reconnex, Ahuja founded and developed several successful companies that were acquired by technology market leaders. Most recently in March 2001, Extreme Networks acquired Webstacks, Inc., which he founded and managed as president and CEO. His team was responsible for the significant development of intellectual property, resulting in the filing of 14 patents. After the acquisition, he led the research and development, quality assurance and marketing teams as vice president of advanced technologies at Extreme Networks, where he was credited with the award-winning application switching product line.
In 1995, Ahuja took another of his companies, Internet Junction, at which he developed a unique protocol translation product, to acquisition by Cisco Systems. Ahuja then became a development manager at Cisco, where he managed various products in the enterprise switching and Internet appliances space. Before founding Internet Junction, Ahuja worked in the datacom industry on technologies such as ATM switching, communication middleware, TCP/IP and OSI protocols.
Ahuja earned a B.E. in electronics from Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology in India. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Iowa State University. He is the holder of multiple patents. Ahuja holds a 4th Degree Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do and is an avid practitioner of QiGong and weight training. [Top]
Faizel Lakhani
Vice President of Products and Marketing
Faizel Lakhani is responsible for products and marketing strategy at Reconnex .
Prior to joining Reconnex, Lakhani was Vice President of Marketing at ConSentry Networks, a leading LAN security company, responsible for the go to market plan as well as overall product strategy and direction. Prior to ConSentry, Lakhani was Vice President of Marketing at Caspian Networks, a flow-based routing company, where he was responsible for all aspects of marketing. Lakhani began his career at Nortel Networks holding a number of executive roles in marketing for new and emerging products. Lakhani holds a Masters Degree In Engineering from Carelton University, an MBA from the University of Ottawa and a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical Engineering from McMaster University. [Top]
Kuldeep Sandhu
Vice President of Engineering
Kuldeep Sandhu has over 20 years of technical and management experience at high-tech start-ups, emerging and established companies.
Prior to joining Reconnex, Sandhu was vice president of engineering for Fabric7 Systems, where he led the team to deliver enterprise class infrastructure virtualization solutions for the servers, storage and networked I/0. Before that Sandhu was Executive Vice President of Storage Products at Xiotech Corporation. Sandhu co-founded Maranti Networks an intelligent storage switch company. Prior to co-founding Maranti, Sandhu held various senior management positions at Efficient Networks, iReady Corporation and National Semiconductor.
Sandhu holds a Masters degree in Computer Science from the University of Santa Clara, Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of California at Davis and is a graduate of the Executive Management program Stanford University.[Top]
Gary Taggart
Vice President of Worldwide Sales
Gary Taggart leads all worldwide sales activities at Reconnex, with a focus on increasing the company's already strong sales momentum in the U.S.
Prior to joining Reconnex, Taggart was senior vice president of sales and marketing at Cyberguard, which was acquired by Secure Computing, where he led the company to five quarters of consecutive growth and ultimately revenues exceeding $66 million. Prior to Cyberguard, Taggart was general manager of the Americas at Webwasher AG, where he established a $6 million run-rate business within 18 months, while revitalizing the company's strategic worldwide relationship with Network Appliance. Taggart previously held executive positions at Solid Data Systems, Amplify.net, Eicon Technology and Storage Dimensions. Taggart holds an MBA in marketing and finance, and a Bachelors of Arts degree in political science both from the University of California, Los Angeles.[Top]
Allan Thompson
Vice President of Business Development
Allan is responsible for developing and managing relationships with strategic and technical partners.
Allan brings to Reconnex 18 years of experience, most of it growing and leading world-class anti-virus, intrusion prevention, and endpoint security companies. Prior to Reconnex, he was Sr. Vice President of Enterprise Sales and Business Development for Tenebril, Inc., a leading anti-spyware software company. Prior to Tenebril, Allan was the President and CEO of Senforce technologies, Inc.. Before Senforce, Allan was the Vice President of Business Development for IntruVert Networks, the leader and pioneer of Intrusion Prevention network appliances. Prior to IntruVert, Allan was the Sr. Vice President of Global Alliances and Marketing at Trend Micro the global leader and pioneer of Internet Gateway anti-virus. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA.[Top]
