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Shiva Pillay succeeds Shaun McLagan as Veeam APJ leader

Outgoing APJ lead McLagan departs after more than three-and-a-half years in the top job
Shaun McLagan and Shiva Pillay (Veeam)

Shaun McLagan and Shiva Pillay (Veeam)

Veeam has appointed Shiva Pillay, its former Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) sales and field operations vice president of more than two-and-a-half years, as its new senior vice president for the region, replacing outgoing leader Shaun McLagan in the top job.

McLagan departs his APJ leadership role with the backup and data management solutions vendor roughly three-and-a-half years after stepping into the job following his departure from Dell EMC, where he was vice president for APJ.

Before taking up Dell EMC’s APJ leadership in Singapore, McLagan held a number of Australia and New Zealand leadership roles within EMC – before its merger with Dell – and its security division, RSA. Prior to joining EMC, he also did time with CA Technologies, HP and Oracle, the latter from the company’s Toronto offices in Canada.  

“With a focus on people we have been able to develop, promote, retain and attract the best in industry. This team is absolutely world-class,” McLagan said in a social media post of his time at the regional helm for the vendor.

“Growing at 24 per cent CAGR [compound annual growth rate] #Veeam in APJ has outstripped the market by eight-10 [times]. I am also proud to see the ‘VeeamTeamAPJ’ play a prominent role in Veeam's overall global success. I will always look back fondly when I think of what we have achieved and the fun we have had,” he said. 

Credit: Veeam

Now, with McLagan having departed the role, Pillay has stepped up to take the vendor’s APJ reins. His ascension to the job comes more than two-and-a-half years after he joined Veeam from cyber security firm the SCE Group, where he was executive in residence, vice president, global sales strategy, mergers and acquisitions.

Pillay has also spent time with Prevalent Inc and SevOne, both from the United States. Additionally, Pillay worked at EMC’s RSA security division from Singapore in various roles, including APJ director, global services lead, from 2008 until 2015.

The last three years of Pillay’s tenure at RSA coincided with the first three years of McLagan’s tenure as the company’s A/NZ general manager.

“Almost three years ago, a good friend rang me from halfway across the world as I sat in my living room in the US,” Pillay said in a social media post on 15 February. “He talked about joining a company with great products, focused on people and willing to invest in its partners and customers. Seeing the unique opportunity, I moved back to Singapore and joined the growth story.

“While the description was accurate, that growth story has proven to be so much more. We continue to build very talented teams to capture market share, work alongside world-class leaders [and] colleagues every day, and also had the opportunity to develop ourselves personally and career-wise along the way.

“As that friend Shaun McLagan moves onto his next journey, we all wish him continued success,” he added. “Honoured to have the privilege of leading the APJ Veeam team into its next phase of growth.”

The leadership change comes as Veaam combines two teams in the APJ region, expanding the remit of APJ senior channels director Belinda Jurisic to take charge of its cloud service provider (VCSP) team, in addition to her current duties within the channel portfolio. 

VCSP previously ran as a separate business unit, and was combined into one unit in APJ following the departure of former APJ cloud and services providers vice president Asanga Wanigatunga in January.

As part of her expanded remit, Jurisic will be responsible for driving cloud adoption and growth among Veeam’s APJ service providers, customers and building go-to-market (GTM) strategies. In APJ, Veeam’s ecosystem is made up of more than 2,500 active resellers, cloud and service providers.