In this monthly feature, we’ll keep you up-to-date on the latest career developments for individuals in the big data community. Whether it’s a promotion, new company hire, or even an accolade, we’ve got the details. Check in each month for an updated list and you may even come across someone you know, or better yet, yourself!

Tom Fisher

Tom Fisher has been named CTO of MapR Technologies. He joins MapR from Oracle where he was the senior vice president and CIO for global commercial cloud services. Prior to Oracle, Fisher served as the CIO and vice president of cloud computing at SuccessFactors. He has over 20 years of advanced technology experience.

“I’m thrilled to join during this exciting stage of growth for the company,” said Fisher. “The enterprise focus, level of innovation, and collaboration that drives MapR are impressive. I look forward to working with this talented team, engaging directly with companies worldwide to help customers achieve success with our product and SI partners. MapR’s enterprise, purpose-built platform is the future of applications delivered using the latest technologies while promoting platform and cloud independence.”

Kimberly Alexy

Kimberly Alexy has been appointed to Alteryx’s board of directors. She founded Alexy Capital Management in 2005 and is currently the company’s principal. Alexy has served on a number of different boards throughout her career including Microsemi Corporation, VIZIO, and Dot Hill Systems, to name just a few. She has over 20 years of financial services experience.

“The self-service analytics platform from Alteryx solves an immediate need within businesses searching for quicker data-driven insights,” said Alexy. “I’m very excited to join this dynamic company with a strong, experienced management team. I look forward to contributing to the next stage of its growth.”

Simon Dale

MapR Technologies has named Simon Dale the vice president of Asia Pacific and Japan where he will be responsible for the company’s business expansion across the region. Prior to joining MapR, Dale held a number of different positions at SAP, all centered on the Asia Pacific and Japan region.

“MapR presents a once in a generation opportunity to re-platform enterprise organizations,” said Dale. “There is tremendous growth potential for MapR across Asia. I look forward to contributing to the company’s momentum and expansion of our customer and partner ecosystem in the region.”

David Andersen, Thomas Bain, Ian O’Connell, and Carl Waldspurger

Pepperdata has formed a brand new technology advisory board and its members consist of David Andersen, Thomas Bain, Ian O’Connell, and Carl Waldspurger.

David Andersen is an associate professor in the Computer Science department at Carnegie Mellon University. He received his Ph.D. and M.S. degrees from MIT and is also the CTO and co-founder of an Internet service provider in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Thomas Bain is a managing director at BlackRock and also serves as the chief administrative officer for BlackRock’s Aladdin Product Group. He has over 30 years of financial services experience.

Ian O’Connell currently works as a software engineer at Stripe but is also known for his role at Twitter where he led development on several data-processing-related open source libraries. He received his degree in computer science from Trinity College in Dublin.

Carl Waldspurger is a consultant and technical advisor and previously spent time as a principal engineer at VMware. Prior to that, he was a researcher at the DEC/Compaq Systems Research Center (now HP Labs). He received his Ph.D. in computer science at MIT.

“Enterprise Big Data application performance is more important than ever,” said Ash Munshi, CEO of Pepperdata. “Performance means the difference between business critical or business useless. Our new Technology Advisory Board members not only understand Big Data, but also know how to build systems at scale. As a result of their guidance, as well as feedback from our customers, we will be bringing exciting new products to market in the coming months.”