Riverbed appoints Uma Thana Balasingam as vice president of channels, APJ

Uma Thana Balasingam is stepping up to become vice president of channels for Riverbed Asia Pacific Japan. She will be based in Singapore but will also be working with Charles de Jesus, ANZ channel director, to develop the company's regional partners.

She will also help form market strategies across its channel, as well as service providers and key alliances, with the aim of promoting company growth, building embedded solutions, driving engagement and accelerating repeatable revenue in smaller enterprise and mid-markets.

"It's an exciting time to be joining Riverbed with emerging technologies disrupting the status quo, new ways to engage and connect with customers, and entirely new routes to market changing the business landscape," Balasingam says.

"Uma is coming onboard at a pivotal time in the growth of Riverbed's business in APJ. We've made a rapid, significant shift to a platform-centric company, and our success in driving our total portfolio to the market relies so much on the channel. Helping our partners understand the benefits of building their own services on Riverbed solutions and ensuring they feel supported by our programs is critical to our business," says Bjorn Engelhardt, senior vice president, Asia Pacific - Japan at Riverbed Technology.

Uma's proven business and channel leadership, together with her deep understanding of the regional dynamics, will be a tremendous asset," Engelhardt continues.

Balasingam's fifteen years of experience of channel development in the region, with previous leadership and senior director roles at EMC, as well as management roles at Brocade and sales at IBM.

"I'm pleased to have the opportunity to help our partners make this shift through differentiated embedded solutions and services as well as new revenue and services opportunities. Riverbed's disruptive SD-WAN, visibility and software-defined edge platforms, along with its continued leadership in WAN optimisation, make it the ideal go-to-market partner in this dynamic market," Balasingam continues.

She is also the founder of Lean Women in Technology Asia, a not-for-profit company and online group that helps women achieve their goals

Riverbed's network of 3000 partners across the globe include technologies, resellers, distributors, service providers and integrators.