Jerry Carter

• Invest strategically in early-stage ventures focused on the future of Human-AI co-existence, the digital workforce, and industry / market transformation. • Leverage extensive executive experience and technical expertise to evaluate technology viability, product-market fit, and scalability for sustainable growth. • Provide hands-on mentorship and strategic guidance to founders on business planning, fundraising, and scaling operations. • Serve as a trusted advisor by offering insights on industry trends, competitive positioning, and go-to-market strategies. • Build and maintain a strong network of founders, investors, and industry leaders to facilitate collaboration and growth opportunities.

I lead high-performing, global organizations of varying sizes to deliver industry-leading offerings. I was accountable for complete products in the Unstructured Data Solutions portfolio (PowerScale, ObjectScale). My most recent role focuses on integrating hardware and software solutions across both UDS and Data Protection (PowerProtect) to create a high-quality, robust foundation for product appliances, leveraging common assets wherever possible. Some of my key accomplishments include: • Spearheaded a large-scale transformation of software development processes by implementing Scrum@Scale, driving agility and operational excellence. • Increased leadership succession pipelines by mentoring an internal, cross-organizational community of directors and senior directors, and serving as one of a small number of executive sponsors for internal leadership development programs. • Oversaw customer-focused product engineering in support of escalation management, ensuring seamless coordination and direct customer engagement as required. • Improved product quality by collaborating across organizational boundaries to enhance integration of hardware and software assets, with a focus on diagnostics and serviceability designs. • Established partnerships with sales leadership, resulting in my role as an executive sponsor for multiple Fortune 100 customers. • Modeled adaptable leadership through two different product-line role transitions.

I led the Isilon engineering organization, overseeing development, product releases, and innovation for Isilon OneFS and InsightIQ. Some of my key accomplishments include: • Delivered eight successful software release cycles, introducing key features such as SMB3 continuous availability. • Advanced Isilon’s data lake by enhancing NFS/SMB file services, identity management, Hadoop shared storage, and OpenStack Swift integration. • Implemented process improvements in distributed version control (Git), CI/CD (Jenkins), build systems, testing methodologies, Lean processes, and Kanban adoption. • Led the development of several major OneFS features, including SMB3 continuous availability.

I worked with the team of Likewise Software engineers post-acquisition to integrate and advance new SMB and Identity Management capabilities into Isilon software releases. • Led a team to implement and integrate the initial SMB3 functionality for Windows Server 2012 clients. • Introduced the current non-disruptive upgrade functionality, including support for rollback, to Isilon’s clustered storage, enabling customers to perform live, production upgrades.

During my six years at Likewise Software (formerly known as Centeris), I advanced from software engineer to CTO, leading technology strategy, and as a member of the executive team, resulted in the company’s strategic acquisition by EMC in 2012. Some of my key accomplishments include: • Contributed to multiple product pivots, arriving at the company’s successful technology licensing strategy. • Led the design team for critical file services development, which resulted in a pivot to a technology licensing business model. • Managed platform strategy and engineering partnerships with major industry players such as Isilon, Data Domain, and VMware. • Led the "Likewise Open" open-source community, including collaboration with Canonical and the Ubuntu community for inclusion in their Linux distribution.

As an author and instructor, I taught tutorials and courses focused on networked services such as LDAP, NAS services, and mail integration. Key accomplishment: • Taught over 1,000 attendees over the course of a decade on topics such as network communications, security protocols, systems administration, file services, data migration, and cloud storage at conferences including LinuxWorld, OSCON, SambaXP, USENIX LISA, USENIX ATC, and SNIA SDC.

I was an open-source software engineer contributing to SAMBA and responsible for the design, implementation, and quality of components in HP products. Key accomplishments: • Core developer and release manager for the open-source software project Samba, a Windows-compatible file and print server for Unix/Linux systems. • Member of HP’s Open Source Review Board, advising on open-source integration strategies and licensing approvals.

VA Linux was one of the first desktop and server Linux OEM vendors, as well as the creator of SourceForge. As part of the Professional Services organization, my role was to enable the successful production deployment of Linux-based solutions for our customers. • Core developer as part of the SAMBA open-source project. • Engaged in software infrastructure deployments for ISPs, ISVs, and enterprise customers.

I was a System & Network Administrator for both the School of Human Sciences and the College of Engineering, responsible for Windows-based student labs and academic faculty systems. • Designed, configured, and operated undergraduate student labs and network services for a combination of Windows clients and Solaris servers. • Provided technical support for faculty, staff, and students.