Rhody Burton (Google Cloud)
Rhody Burton, who has headed up Google Cloud’s partnerships and alliances business in Australia and New Zealand for close to four years, has left the cloud vendor and is set to take on a regional leadership role with HashiCorp.
“Today is my last day at Google Cloud. What a phenomenal ride it has been,” Burton said in a social media update on 5 November. “I’m so proud of my incredible team, the amazing partner community we have built, the number of customers we have helped innovate with Google Cloud technology and, most of all, what I have learned.
“I feel very grateful for the past four years where I’ve had the opportunity to work with so many talented people and can’t wait to see Google Cloud continue on this hyper growth trajectory we started,” she added, thanking her former employer and its partner network for their support over the years.
Burton also revealed that she would be starting a new role with HashiCorp "very soon" as the US-based cloud infrastructure automation vendor’s new senior director of partner sales in Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ).
It is understood that Google Cloud is currently on the hunt for a replacement to fill the role vacated by Burton.
Burton was appointed as head of partnerships for Google Cloud across Australia and New Zealand in late 2017, several months after leaving IBM, where she held the role of global business partners director, Australia and New Zealand.
At IBM, Burton was responsible for the growth and enablement of Big Blue’s partner ecosystem across A/NZ, through the vendor’s ‘One Channel Team’ push locally.
During her tenure at IBM, Burton led the channel through a period of sizeable industry change, as the tech giant moved to shed its traditional image in favour of a cloud-focused approach.
Prior to joining IBM in 2015, Burton was channel sales director for SAP in the local market for over two years, a role she took after more than six years with VMware, close to three of which she spent as A/NZ cloud and channels manager.
While at VMware, Burton took out the Rising Star award at the 2012 Women in ICT Awards (WIICTA), in recognition of her “dedication and passion” to career advancement, alongside her ongoing work within the channel.
Upon joining Google Cloud in January 2018, Burton was charged with creating a network of providers capable of gunning for cloud market share on both sides of the Tasman, a goal she has undoubtedly achieved during her years with the vendor.
Burton’s appointment was seen at the time as providing the cloud giant with much needed credibility in both the channel and enterprise space, leveraging experience from IBM, SAP and VMware.
During her time at Google Cloud, Burton oversaw a varied and deep Google Cloud ecosystem, spanning independent software vendors (ISVs); system integrators (SIs); born-in-the-cloud players; developers; consultancy houses; managed service providers (MSPs); global system integrators (GSIs) and telecommunications firms.
"Thank you to everyone at Google Cloud and our partner community for all your support and I look forward to meeting lots of new people and bringing lots of the[m] both together," Rhody said in her social media post.
While Google Cloud is yet to name Burton's permanent replacement, the company has confirmed that Ash Willis, managing director of partnerships and alliances in Asia Pacific is the interim head of partnerships for Google Cloud in A/NZ.
"We thank Rhody for her invaluable support and contribution to our A/NZ business over the last four years," a Google Cloud spokesperson told ARN. "We wish her all the best in her new role as the new APJ Channel Leader for HashiCorp, a valued partner of ours, and look forward to continuing working closely with her."
