Isilon Founder Sujal Patel Joins Elemental Board

Elemental Technologies appointed Sujal Patel to its board of directors. Patel is the founder of Isilon Systems, a leader in scale-out storage and a division of EMC, where he variously served as president, CEO and chief technology officer since its inception in 2001. Patel joins the Elemental board, replacing long-time advisor Bob Greenberg, as Elemental positions itself for further growth in 2013 and beyond.

“Sujal Patel helped grow Isilon from an innovative startup to a market-leading enterprise storage supplier, taking the company public and ultimately selling it to EMC for $2.25 billion,” said Sam Blackman, CEO and co-founder of Elemental. “The unique leadership and entrepreneurial experience Sujal brings to Elemental will help guide our anticipated growth as we continue to expand share and extend our leadership within the video market.”

“With its proven ability to help media and entertainment companies navigate new methods of video delivery, Elemental is driving disruptive change in much the same way that Isilon helped redefine enterprise storage,” said Patel. “On its current trajectory, Elemental is exceptionally well-positioned to expand into new vertical markets, a growth strategy with which I am deeply familiar and can provide valuable counsel to the team and company.”

Patel is recognized for pioneering the technical architecture for clustered storage, creating a new sector in the enterprise storage market, and holds a number of patents and pending patents, including those for the Isilon OneFS distributed file system. Prior to founding Isilon, Patel served in various engineering roles at RealNetworks. He is also a board member at Extrahop Networks, a Seattle-based startup that supplies network-based application performance management solutions. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Maryland at College Park.

With 200+ customers in more than 30 countries, Elemental experienced significant expansion in the last eighteen months. The company grew revenues domestically as well as in the Latin America, EMEA, and Asia Pacific regions, with additional resources added in each region in 2012. Elemental was named the second-fastest growing private software company in America by Inc. magazine and was recognized as one of Forbes’ most promising companies in America.

As Patel joins the team, Elemental extends its heartfelt thanks to Bob Greenberg for his many years of service and invaluable guidance as a member of the Elemental board. Bob led the Oregon Angel Fund’s investment in Elemental, which was the company’s first external investor.