Rick Walsworth VP Marketing, Formation Data Systems

Formation Data Systems, Inc., a start-up in enterprise storage, announced the appointment of Rick Walsworth, VP marketing, and Eric Chan, VP of finance and administration, to its executive ranks.

Underscoring the company’s commitment to transform the antiquated and costly enterprise storage market, Formation Data Systems chairman and CEO said: “Formation is continuing to build momentum in the storage market. To account for our fast client growth, we recognized the need to recruit the best talent and team players in the industry to help drive us further forward. Both Rick and Eric, coming from strong IT backgrounds at EMC, were the perfect fit for our executive team. They are both strategic thinkers focused on execution, who have a deep understanding of our vision for the market as well as our modern approach to dynamic storage.”

With more than two decades of experience building and transforming emerging technology brands, Rich Walsworth brings a track record of marketing and communications expertise. In his role, he will be responsible for driving brand and corporate strategy across all marketing and communications initiatives to drive awareness and revenue growth for the company as it continues to execute on its mission to transform storage. Prior to joining Formation, he was director of product marketing for EMC’s emerging technologies division where he drove product and go-to-market strategy as part of the company’s acquisition of Kashya, a privately held provider of enterprise data replication and data protection software. Prior to Kashya being acquired, he served as VP marketing, driving awareness and revenue growth for the company in the competitive storage market, following marketing leadership roles at Maranti Networks and SAN Valley Systems.

In the position of VP of finance and administration, Eric Chan brings close to two decades of experience as a finance leader to Formation. He will be responsible for all financial operations and planning, also serving HR functions. Before joining Formation, he served as the head of finance at Syncplicity, a business unit at EMC. During his tenure, he built the business unit’s finance and accounting functions required to fulfill quarterly compliance requirements and achieving operating numbers targets while balancing the longer-term vision for future investments. Before leading the Syncplicity finance and accounting team, he held various operating and financial management leadership roles at companies such as SuccessFactors and VMWare, another EMC company.