Pivot3 appoints Rich Bravman its new CEO

Pivot3's Rich Bravman

Pivot3, Inc., a provider of unified storage and compute appliances, announced on Nov. 1 that Rich Bravman has been named the company’s new chief executive officer, effective immediately.

Bravman is responsible for driving the company’s next phase of expansion and growth in both new and existing markets, says Pivot3. He assumes the role from Robert Fernander, who has served as the company's president and CEO since 2007 and will continue in a key role spearheading business development and major account penetration for Pivot3.

“Rich is a proven leader with an impressive track record in taking start-ups to global publicly-traded technology leaders. Having grown through the ranks from software engineer to CEO, and having been associated with technologies that are a mix of both hardware and software, makes Rich a perfect fit for Pivot3,” said Ron Nash, chairman of the board of Pivot3.

“His extensive experience leading teams as a chief executive across several enterprise-focused private and public organizations will be essential to our growth plans. Rich's expertise in driving and creating market leadership for technology products will also be invaluable to our existing surveillance business as well as our new desktop virtualization products.”

Bravman brings with him more than 30 years of executive management and board level experience at technology companies, ranging from start-ups to global S&P 500 companies, says the Pivot3 news release.

Most recently, Bravman served as vice president of corporate development and chief marketing officer at NCR Corp, a Fortune 500 technology leader in self-service solutions for ATM machines, retail and airline check-in systems. At NCR, Bravman was responsible for all corporate marketing, business development activities, and forged several strategic partnerships for the company.

Previously, Bravman was chairman and chief executive officer at Intelleflex, Inc., where his leadership helped the RFID technology start-up raise $51 million in venture funding and develop key partnerships with Lockheed Martin, Mitsubishi and Motorola.

Bravman started his career at Symbol Technologies where, during his 26-year tenure at that company, he held several positions with increasing responsibility and eventually assumed the role of chief executive officer and vice chairman. As CEO, Bravman led a major turnaround effort at Symbol, which paved the way for the company’s eventual acquisition by Motorola in 2007.

“The timing of the opportunity to join a world-class leadership team with industry-changing technology in a white-hot market was one that I couldn't refuse,” Bravman said, according bto the company’s news release. “Pivot3’s unique approach of delivering affordable, purpose-built appliances that unify storage and compute for targeted markets makes their offerings accessible to a broad range of businesses, creating incredible potential for expansion.”

Bravman joins a seasoned executive management team that is dedicated to building on success to date and to expanding Pivot3 products into new markets with the goal of continuing to double sales year after year. Over the past year, the company added several world-class industry veterans, including Deb MacCallum as vice president of engineering, Curt Wittich as vice president of sales, and most recently, Olivier Thierry as chief marketing officer.