Rick Powles UK and Ireland MD, Acronis

Acronis International GmbH announced the appointment of IT industry veteran Rick Powles as MD, UK and Ireland.

 Powles brings more than two decades of experience delivering sales growth within software companies across EMEA, including CommVault and Veritas/Symantec.

He will develop new channels and strategies to help Acronis address new opportunities presented by the widespread adoption of virtual environments, cloud storage and the consumerisation of IT.

Based in the Acronis office in London, UK he will be responsible for creating and maintaining relationships within its growing customer base, and with channel partners focused on small business and enterprise needs across the UK and Ireland.  

"IT organisations are under tremendous pressure to deliver every time, everywhere access to data, on any device by an increasingly empowered end user. When combined with the explosive growth in data, a virtual first movement and pressures to optimise cloud adoption, they have to re-think data protection approaches and stay relevant," commented Powles. "I am excited to join Acronis at this transformational time in their business, and at that of our customers."

"We are delighted to welcome somebody of Rick’s calibre and experience to our team," said Alan Laing, VP EMEA, Acronis. "Rick has successfully built and led sales teams in both SMB and enterprise organisations, and has demonstrated his ability to achieve significant sales growth. The combination of sector, segment and channel knowledge will  help to strengthen and grow our business in the UK and Ireland."

Powles joins Acronis from Informatica where he served as VP of Northern Europe. Previously he helped transform CommVault’s business in Southern Europe, growing revenues over four consecutive years from $8.5M to $25M. He also played a central role in building Oracle‘s CRM business, catapulting it to Europe’s second-highest earning company in the market. He has held a number of senior leadership positions at organisations such as Veritas/Symantec and Aurum/BaaN.