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April was filled with grim news in the tech sector, with significant layoffs at Tesla and Expedia. But there were also plenty of signs that Austin tech companies and startups are hungry for talent.
Dozens of local businesses made key executive hires in April, including Silicon Labs, Infleqtion and South by Southwest. And a few others, such as drone boat startup Saronic, announced plans to expand their teams.
Let's take a quick look at the biggest tech and startup hiring announcements from April.
Earlier this year, Elon Musk's X, the social media company formerly known as Twitter, said it was building a "Trust and Safety Center of Excellence" in Austin. Now we know who will be leading the charge. The company said April 2 that Kylie McRoberts has been promoted to head of safety and will be in charge of building out the new center in Austin. It remains unclear where in Austin that hub may be located.
McRoberts was previously a group product manager at Twitter. Before that, she was a senior strategist with Google's safe browsing team and a project manager at NiSoft. In its announcement, X said that McRoberts has been key in developing new safety standards. In her new role, she'll be in charge of developing new tools to protect users, as well as enforce the company's policies. The company's previous trust and safety leader, Yoel Roth, resigned last November and later faced a series of threats that followed Musk's public criticism of his work.
High-performance computer workstation company Boxx Technologies said April 2 that it has named Kirk Schell as its new CEO. He was previously president of global components at Arrow Electronics Inc. and, before that, he was senior VP of global e-commerce at Dell Technologies. He's taking over from interim CEO Wes Breyfogle, who is a partner at Craftsman Capital Partners.
Boxx was initially founded in Phoenix in 1996 as Digital Emulsion Inc. It relocated to Austin in 1998 and renamed itself. The company's workstations are used in film editing, animation and several other industries.
Austin-based Snap Kitchen has a new CEO with plans to reinvigorate its growth. The ready-to-eat meal company began grooming Mitchell Raisch in October through a position as chief marketing officer. Raisch’s experience with growing companies includes working with Austin-based F45 as CMO. He also built a beverage company, Just Chill, that culminated in an acquisition. Keep reading.
Virtual coaching and mental health startup BetterUp said April 4 that it appointed Jolen Anderson as the company’s first-ever chief people and community officer. She was most recently chief people officer and global head of impact citizenship at New York-based financial services company BNY Mellon. Before that, she was chief human resources officer and chief diversity officer at Visa. Anderson is also an executive advisory board member at SemperVirens Venture Capital.
BetterUp, founded in 2013 and led by co-founder and CEO Alexi Robichaux, has raised $570 million from investors including Wellington Management, ICONIQ Growth and Lightspeed Venture Partners. It has offices in Austin, as well as San Francisco, Washington, D.C., London and Amsterdam.
Spicewood-based frequency control and RF signal company Abracon LLC announced a pile of C-suite promotions April 4.
Brian Holt, who was previously VP of global sales at the company, was named chief revenue officer. Richard Diaz, previously VP of global operations, has become chief operating officer. Former VP of Engineering Syed Raza was promoted to chief technology officer. And Amy Keller, former VP of global marketing, has taken the title of chief marketing officer.
The moves come about two years after Abracon, founded in 1992, was purchased by private equity firm Genstar Capital and about a year after the company acquired NEL Frequency Controls Inc., a Wisconsin-based manufacturer of ultra-low phase noise crystal oscillators, which are used in computer chips.
Infleqtion, the locally based quantum tech company we mentioned above, said April 5 that it has appointed Matthew Kinsella as its new CEO. He's been a managing director at Maverick Capital for the past 18-plus years. He has also been an Infleqtion investor and board member since 2018. Infleqtion, legally known as ColdQuanta Inc., was founded in 2007. Former CEO Scott Faris is now going to focus on broader industry policies and investment opportunities.
SXSW LLC, the company behind the annual conferences and festivals, said April 9 that it has named Leanna Rossmann as its new CFO. She was most recently VP of finance at Warner Music Group. Before that, she was VP of finance and controllership at The Walt Disney Co., a role she took on after Disney acquired Twentieth Century Fox, where she had been VP and global head of Fox Music finance and accounting.
Rossmann takes over for Sheri Furley, who is retiring after being CFO and, before that, controller at SXSW since 2015.
Austin-based legal tech company CS Disco Inc. (NYSE: LAW) said April 10 it has appointed Eric Friedrichsen as president and CEO, as well as granting him a position on the company's board. He'll take over at the end of the month for Scott Hill, who took on the CEO role after founder and former CEO Kiwi Camara abruptly left the company last September amid reports of alleged sexual harassment and misconduct. Hill, meanwhile, will become board chair on May 12 and will assist with the CEO transition.
“I am proud of the way the DISCO team responded to a very difficult year in 2023 by recommitting to our customers and each other,” Hill stated. “We have talented people, innovative products, great customers, and a large, growing market opportunity. Eric is the right leader to enhance our approach and drive the execution necessary to successfully write DISCO’s next chapter.”
Friedrichsen was most recently CEO of expense management company Emburse LLC. Before that, he was global head of commercial and growth markets at Marketo Inc., which is a subsidiary of Adobe Inc. He's also held leadership roles at SAP and SAP Concur.
Austin-based media optimization platform Measured Inc. said that it has named Will Post as head of sales and Elizabeth Garza as senior vice president of customer success. Post was previously VP of North America client organization at VidMob, and, before that, he worked in CPG advertising partnerships for Facebook’s global sales group. Garza was most recently vice president of client services at Kargo.
Measured was founded in 2017. It has raised about $25 million, according to Crunchbase, and it is led by co-founder and CEO Trevor Testwuide.
Austin-based managed services provider TPx Communications said April 10 that it has appointed Steve Grabow as the company's first chief commercial officer and Adeel Omer as chief marketing officer. Grabow was most recently senior VP of edge technologies at Lumen Technologies. Omer was also most recently at Lumen Technologies as vice president and head of enterprise customer experience.
TPx, led by CEO Shaun Andrews, was founded in California in 1998 and has raised $292 million in funding, with its most recent private equity round in 2011, according to Crunchbase. Its corporate HQ is in Austin.
Austin-based edtech and training startup Interplay Learning said April 12 that it has hired Elias Tavarez as chief revenue officer. He was most recently a senior vice president at FourKites Inc., a supply chain intelligence platform.
Interplay, led by founder and CEO Doug Donovan, uses videos, AR and VR to develop training for skilled trades. It was founded in 2016 and has raised $24.5 million, according to Crunchbase.
Austin-based digital banking company Green Dot Corp. (NYSE: GDOT), said April 15 that it added Renata Caine as general manager of banking as a service. She was most recently a consulting advisor for Bay Area VC firm Point72 Ventures. In 2022 and 2023, she was chief commercial officer at financial services company Justt. And, before that, she was a senior vice president of international planning at Marqeta.
Green Dot, founded in 1999, is led by CEO George Gresham.
Austin-based cybersecurity company Forcepoint LLC said April 18 it has appointed Naveen Palavalli as its new chief marketing officer. He was most recently VP of global product and solutions marketing at Netskope. Before that, he was VP and head of enterprise go-to-market at McAfee and also held leadership roles at Cisco, Microsoft and Symantec.
Forcepoint, owned by Francisco Partners and led by CEO Manny Rivelo, sold its government cybersecurity business to asset management giant TPG Inc. last year for $2.45 billion.
Austin-based wireless tech and IoT company Silicon Labs said April 19 that it has named Radhika Chennakeshavula as its chief information officer. She was previously vice president of infrastructure operations and engineering services at Western Digital. Before that, she was senior director of IT for Micron Technology's India office.
And on April 24, Silicon Labs said that it named one of its board members, Bob Conrad, as its senior vice president of worldwide operations. Conrad, who is also owner of North Water Marine, was previously senior vice president and general manager of automotive microcontrollers at NXP Semiconductors. He's also held leadership roles at Fairchild Semiconductor, Analog Devices and Texas Instruments.
The company said its current global operations leader, Sandeep Kumar, will leave the company in the second half of 2024.
EnergyX, a lithium extraction tech startup that has a sizable presence in Austin, named Allen Satterwhite as its new president on April 24. He was most recently president at Chevron Pipeline & Power. Before that, he was senior vice president of asset development at Chevron's IndoAsia Business Unit.
EnergyX, legally known as Energy Exploration Technologies, was founded in 2018 and is led by CEO Teague Egan. It has raised about $80 million, including a $50 million series B led by GM Ventures about a year ago.
Local healthcare AI startup Autonomize AI said April 30 that it appointed Dr. Jennifer Kloke as vice president of AI and Jeffrey Eyestone as vice president of business development. Kloke was most recently an AI engineering consultant at software development company Bluebirds. Before that, she was a senior staff machine learning engineer for premium data at LinkedIn. Eyestone was previously the AI / ML sales and marketing lead at Tecnotree Corporation, and, before that, he held the same role at CognitiveScale, which was acquired by Tecnotree last year. Before that, he held executive roles in the healthcare solutions departments of J.P. Morgan and Wells Fargo.
Autonomize, led by founder and CEO Ganesh Padmanabhan, develops AI copilots to contextualize unstructured data. The startup launched out of stealth last year with $4 million in seed funding, and it was one of Austin Inno's 2024 Startups to Watch.
