Author: Oxfordadmin@878

While Sundar Pichai’s star at Google (GOOG) rises, Andy Rubin’s is falling, as the former Android founder and guru is leaving the company to launch an incubator for hardware product startups.

The Wall Street Journal first reported Rubin’s exit, which subsequently was confirmed by chief executive Larry Page.

“I want to wish Andy all the best with what’s next,” said Page in a statement. “With Android he created something truly remarkable—with a billion-plus happy users. Thank you.”

Google bought Android in 2005 along with founder Rubin and he helped the mobile OS to become the world’s most popular smartphone platform, as evidenced by its current 85 percent market share.

Rubin, who stepped down as Android boss in March 2013 in a move that saw Pichai add the mobile OS to his Chrome OS and Google Apps responsibilities, had been leading Google’s robotics effort, which included a number of related acquisitions such as Boston Dynamics in December 2013, Schaft, Meka Robotics and five others.

His exit appears to have caught Google somewhat by surprise, considering his robotics work at the company was ongoing and had yet to come to fruition. However, a Journal source said Rubin’s entrepreneurial spirit may have gotten the best of him, noting he was dealing with some constraints on his activities at the company.

Google hasn’t said publicly why Rubin left and he hasn’t said anything either.

A Google spokesperson told the Journal that the vendor will continue to invest in robotics despite Rubin’s departure. James Kuffner, a Google research scientist and current member of its robotics team, will take Rubin’s place running the unit, the Journal reported. Kuffner is said to be well-versed in robotics, previously working on human-like robot technology for some 20 years, including five years on Google’s self-driving car project.

In a new reorganization spearheaded by Page, Pichai now is boss of all the company’s core products, including commerce and ads, Google+, infrastructure, maps, research and search.

Enterprise data security provider Vormetric has joined the McAfee Security Innovation Alliance (SIA) Program as a Sales Teaming Partner, the company announced during the McAfee FOCUS 2014 conference in Las Vegas. The addition of Vormetric’s solutions to the McAfee security portfolio aims to improve organizational compliance and regulatory issues while creating an added layer of protection against potential data breaches.

Vormetric also completed integration with McAfee Database Activity Monitoring and McAfee Enterprise Security Manager as part of its new relationship with the company. The Vormetric solution is expected to extend the protection offered by the McAfee Data Center Security Suite for Databases and increase visibility, threat protection and audit reporting of McAfee Enterprise Security Manager, according to the company. Similarly, the Vormetric Transparent Encryption solution will enable data-at-rest encryption and additional user access controls to create an audit trail of authorized and unauthorized file access.

“This relationship and integration provides our joint customers with a more complete solution for protecting sensitive information within their databases and file systems by adding data-at-rest encryption, key management, privileged user access controls and enhancing the information available for analysis by McAfee Enterprise Security Manager,” said Ed Barry, vice president, Global Technology Alliances at McAfee, part of Intel Security, in a statement.

Vormetric’s compatibility with the McAfee SIA is another step in fulfilling the promise made by Intel President Renée James during FOCUS to provide customers with more integrated solutions. McAfee recently released its Threat Intelligence Exchange solution, a new framework that collects threats and acts as a unified defense system for enterprises, according to the company. The new solution also integrates with McAfee’s Security Information and Event Management solution to increase security intelligence and reduce response time.

“We are excited by this new relationship with McAfee, and honored to be selected as a Sales Teaming Partner,” said Alan Kessler, CEO of Vormetric. “With McAfee Compatibility status ensuring interoperability, and the ease of doing business provided by the Sales Teaming Partner program, this is a big win for our joint customers.”

Ex-Cisco Systems (CSCO) executive Chris Young has made the leap to Intel Security, where he has taken on the role of senior vice president and general manager. Young took to the stage at last week’s McAfee FOCUS 2014 conference in Las Vegas to discuss his plans to change the state of enterprise security.

Young said he is looking to tackle three big challenges in the security industry—namely, the changing of the IT landscape, the changing attack landscape and the increasing fragmentation of the industry as a whole. He addressed some of the complexities that continue to plague the security provider market despite continually improving solutions to potential breaches. In what he calls the “industrialization of hacking,” the rapid growth in malware and other malicious software continues to outstrip the pace of security providers such as McAfee as hackers become more skilled in their craft. This, in turn, is changing the established trust abilities we take for granted, including our methods of protecting personal information and establishing secure connections.

“I do believe we’ve reached a point where complexity and fragmentation has become our enemy,” Young said. “Our attackers are innovating even faster than anyone in our industry.”

As one of the main ways to fix our current security problem, Young emphasized the importance of shrinking the attack surface, so security software can more easily pinpoint and eliminate potential threats. This, in turn, will require a simpler security model with which companies such as McAfee can focus their attention on. He also stressed Intel and McAfee’s goal of driving more unified solutions across the IT infrastructure and developing more connected architectures to make security a vital aspect of the entire ecosystem.

“I fundamentally believe that we can empower the connected world,” said Young. “This is our higher cause.”

Young is the second Cisco exec to move to Intel Security, just weeks after the former Cisco Global Vice President of Security Sales Scott Lovett also transferred to his new position as executive vice president of Worldwide Sales.

While all of these are fairly lofty goals, Young said the best way to deal with the increasing danger of cyberattacks in both the public and private sectors is to develop more of a dialogue between customers and their security companies. He also pointed out that recent high-profile breaches came not from a lack of security, but a general lack of coordination between security companies and their end users. By looking to the mistakes of past security failures, Young said, companies can learn from their mistakes and begin building a more secure strategy for dealing with the inevitability of a cyberattack—with McAfee and Intel Security leading the charge, of course.

Storage provider Diablo Technologies has appointed former IBM veteran Alex Yost as its new president, the company announced Nov. 10. Yost will report to CEO and co-founder Riccardo Badalone, and will be tasked with managing the company’s product portfolio and marketing as Diablo looks to strengthen its management team.

“Memory channel storage is gaining wide adoption in the enterprise,” said Badalone in a statement. “Adding a prominent industry veteran such as Alex will expand the organizational capabilities of the leadership team and better position us for future growth.”

Diablo Technologies is an Ottowa-based storage provider best known for its memory channel storage (MCS) platform, which allows enterprises to virtualize and store low latency workloads using software and hardware architectures with non-volatile memory, according to the company. In August, Diablo announced the upcoming release of Carbon₂, its second-generation MCS platform, and the subsequent release of its NanoCommit technology.

Prior to his appointment at Diablo, Yost led IBM’s high-end x86 server business (which was recently acquired by Lenovo) and helped to build the product line, according to the press release. Yost also has served as vice president of Strategy and Alliances at IBM and held various sales and channel management roles at Xerox.

“Earlier this year, I saw the value of Diablo’s products when I had the chance to announce a system that delivers 99x faster analytics using memory channel storage technology,” said Yost. “I look forward to broadening the leadership skillset and delivering Diablo-based products to a wider market.”

Juniper Networks (JNPR) has dumped its second chief executive in a year’s time as Shaygan Kheradpir, who replaced Kevin Johnson almost exactly a year ago, resigned his post and his board seat in a disagreement over how he handled negotiations with an undisclosed customer.

The networking equipment maker quickly ascended Rami Rahim, a 17-year company veteran, to its helm, effective immediately, and also granted him a seat on its board.

Kheradpir’s “resignation follows a review by the board of directors of his leadership and his conduct in connection with a particular negotiation with a customer,” the company said in a statement. Juniper said its board and Kheradpir “have different perspectives regarding these matters,” but declined to elaborate.

Rahim previously served as executive vice president and general manager of Juniper’s Development and Innovation unit, overseeing research and development programs, strategy, development and business growth across its portfolio of routing, switching and security products. Rahim worked as an engineer on Juniper’s first product, the M40 core router, and was one of the original architects of its MX flagship routing platform.

Juniper officials said the change at the top will not cause the company to deviate from its strategy or financial targets. The company didn’t say if Rahim will keep his schedule to present at the UBS Global Technology Conference in Sausalito, California, Nov. 19, one of two investor conferences the vendor is slated to participate in this month.

“Rami is the right chief executive officer to lead Juniper,” said Scott Kriens, Juniper chairman. “He is a talented leader who brings deep instincts about the networking industry, and enormous support from our employees and our customers.”

Kheradpir, who replaced Johnson in January, joined the company from Barclays, where he served as chief operations and technology officer. At the time of his appointment, Kriens said Kheradpir’s “values and vision for the company align very tightly with our own.”

On Kheradpir’s watch, Juniper cut costs to increase profits but sales remained flat. Through the September quarter, Juniper’s net income jumped some 51 percent while its revenue grew by less than 4 percent, confounded by changes in the networking market.

Activist investor Elliott Management nipped at Kheradpir’s heels throughout his tenure, demanding cost reductions and stock buybacks until the company yielded with a plan to return some $3 billion to shareholders and to cut $160 million in expenses.

Symantec (SYMC) has axed chief operating officer (COO) Stephen Gillett and eliminated his former position altogether, in a move suggesting the company already is taking initial steps to split itself into separate security and storage operations.

In an 8-K Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing on Nov. 13, Symantec said Gillett would remain with the company in a non-executive role during a transitional period and will receive “certain cash severance and equity acceleration benefits for involuntary termination.”

ormer Symantec boss Steve Bennett appointed Gillett as COO in December 2012 as part of his overhaul of the company’s executive suite. Gillett, a former Best Buy (BBY) Digital Global Marketing and Strategy executive vice president and president, handled marketing, communications and IT functions. At Best Buy, Gillett oversaw the retailers’ digital, e-commerce, marketing, information technology, customer insights, enterprise strategy, corporate development, new business ventures, enterprise customer care and channel design.

He also previously served as Starbucks CIO and as Digital Ventures executive vice president.

Gillett is known as a serious gamer, regarded as one of the most innovative Guild Masters in World of Warcraft.

In October, Symantec disclosed its plans to split into two publicly traded companies, a process the company’s top brass said would take more than a year to accomplish. The security vendor has said the split will include organizational changes and layoffs.

According to its most recent 10-Q SEC filing dated Nov. 7, as of Oct. 3 Symantec already had incurred $17 million in charges related to the breakup plan and as of Nov. 3 anticipated another $100 million to $120 in severance and facilities costs, with total restructuring and separation costs expected to rise to $180 million to $220 million.

Symantec’s breakup plans followed word of a similar move by Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) to split into separate PC/printer and enterprise organizations. In a VAR Guy poll following both companies’ disclosures, 45 percent of readers considered both divisions as beneficial to the channel. Some 24 percent believed the separations wouldn’t much matter and 21 percent thought no substantive changes were likely to occur in the short term. About 10 percent were unaware that both companies had divided their operations into two parts.