Sudhakar Ramakrishna is new CEO of SolarWinds victim of major hack
Next Monday, Sudhakar Ramakrishna, 53, takes over as the new chief executive of Solar Winds. Based in Austin, Texas, the company sells software that monitors and manages information technology (IT) systems for clients around the world.
On December 13, six days after the announcement of Ramakrishna as CEO, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an emergency directive asking all federal government civilian agencies to “disconnect…SolarWinds Orion products immediately. “ SolarWinds’ network management systems, “poses unacceptable risks to the security of federal networks,” said Brandon Wales, CISA’s Acting Director.
Hackers, who infiltrated SolarWinds systems as well as servers which host them, can take control of the IT operations of businesses, government agencies, universities, hospitals and other users of SolarWinds’ software around the world.
Activity, following this supply chain compromise of SolarWinds software, “has included lateral movement and data theft. The campaign is the work of a highly skilled actor and the operation was conducted with significant operational security,” notes FireEye, a digital security services provider, in a blog post. The cyber-attack, which is currently underway, is the work of hackers in Russia, said Mike Pompeo, the U.S. Secretary of State.
The malware, given the name SUNBURST, “was inserted within the Orion products and existed in updates released between March and June 2020” SolarWinds said in a regulatory filing. It estimates that the networks of under 18,000 of its 33,000 maintenance customers may have been infiltrated. The company has sent them patches to try to protect their systems.
For the first nine months of 2020, Orion products brought in $343 million in revenue, roughly half of SolarWinds’ revenue for the period. In 2019, the company, which has 3,200 employees, earned $18 million of net profits on $933 million of sales. Since the news broke early this month, of hackers infiltrating SolarWinds’ software, the company’s stock has fallen by more than 40%. It has a market value of $5 billion.
The origin and damage caused by the hack is being investigated by SolarWinds, Microsoft and other companies, CISA, and other U.S. government agencies.
SolarWinds’ new CEO Ramakrishna recently served as the CEO of Pulse Secure, a privately-held provider of IT solutions. Earlier, he served as the Senior Vice President, Enterprise and Service Provider Division, at Citrix, leading its virtualization, cloud networking, mobile platforms and cloud services solutions. Fort Lauderdale, Florida based Citrix, which sells IT software and services, has a market value of $16 billion.
Ramakrishna also held senior leadership roles at Polycom, Motorola, Stoke, 3Com and U.S. Robotics. He earned a master’s degree in computer science from Kansas State University and an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School. He received a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Osmania University in Hyderabad, India.
Eash Sundaram, SolarWinds’ Board Member
SolarWinds’ board member Easwaran (Eash) Sundaram, another Indian American, is the Chief Digital & Technology Officer of JetBlue Airways. Earlier, from 2012 to 2017, he was the Chief Information Officer of the Queens, New York based airline, which has a market value of $4.5 billion.
Sundaram also serves as the Oversight Officer for JetBlue Technology Ventures, that incubates, invests in and partners with early-stage startups. Previously, he was a Senior Vice President of Global Supply Chain Operations at Pall Corporation, a leading vendor of filtration, separation and purification products; and senior supply chain manager at PSS World Medical, now McKesson Corporation.
Besides SolarWinds, Sundaram serves as a director of WESCO International, a vendor of electrical, industrial and communications products. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Madurai Kamaraj University, in Tamil Nadu, India; a Supplemental Degree in Logistics Management from the Institute of Rail Transport, India; and a Masters’ of Science in International Transportation Management from State University of New York Maritime College.
Ramakrishna faces major challenge
In 2021, SolarWinds will pay Ramakrishna salary and benefits totaling $1.9 million. The company will also grant him company shares worth $7 million each year as well as an additional $17 million in shares, which will vest over four years.
On December 9, when the company’s board announced that Ramakrishna would be the new CEO, he stated, “I am honored to have the opportunity to work with the excellent team at SolarWinds to accelerate our focus on customer success.” The massive Russian hack of the IT systems of SolarWinds’ customers, whether he knew about it before taking the CEO role or not, is certainly a major opportunity for him to prove his managerial and technical skills.
