PLANO, Texas, Feb. 24, 2022 — The MDR services provider has added two new roles and promoted three existing employees to Vice President positions — Critical Start, a leading and trusted provider of Managed Detection and Response (MDR) services, announced today that Chris Carlson has been hired as the Vice President of Product and Randy Turer has been hired as Vice President of North American Sales. The company also announced that several existing employees have been promoted to the vice president and senior vice president levels.
“As cybersecurity threats have grown in number and complexity, so has the need for solutions to proactively prevent breaches in a quick and easy manner, meaning that companies can no longer settle for the ‘good enough’ option,” said Critical Start founder and CEO Rob Davis. “Chris and Randy bring a combination of unique experiences that will allow us to continue delivering the most advanced solutions to our customers in a quick, effective and transparent manner. The internal promotions are a testament to the dedication of our team to ensuring our customers’ experiences are optimized to their needs.”
In his role as Vice President of Product, Chris Carlson is responsible for the development of the company’s product strategy and roadmap as well as the delivery of the company’s MDR solutions. The former VP of Product at top industrial control system security provider Dragos and leading vulnerability management vendor Qualys, Carlson brings more than 20 years of product management experience to this new role. He has also served in product-related roles at Hexis Cyber, Invincea and Agent Logic as well as consulting and security architecture roles at SAIC, Booz Allen and UBS.
“Dedication to delivering a stellar product and experience for clients is something I’m passionate about,” said Carlson. “I’m excited to be joining a company that values that as well.”
As Vice President of North American Sales, Randy Turer will serve as the sales leader for the company’s MDR services and will work to drive sales engagements with the company’s partner community, ensure customer satisfaction and help cultivate mutually beneficial partnerships. Turer has a wealth of experience in the security and technology industries. He was previously the head of North America Sales at Absolute Software and has held sales and leadership positions at Symantec, McAfee and ForeScout.
“Critical Start has set the standard for MDR services and has an established track record of success,” said Turer. “I am looking forward to growing our sales organization and working with the team to drive significant growth through our channel community in North America.”
In addition to these new hires, Critical Start has announced three internal promotions. Sarah Mutscheller has been promoted to Vice President of Growth Marketing, which will see her taking charge of the digital, demand generation, content marketing and marketing operations. Jim Rohde has been promoted from Director of Presales to Vice President of Presales. In this role, Jim will continue growing his team and building the presales charter to best showcase the benefits of Critical Start and the value the company’s offerings can deliver. Bill Thrash has been promoted from Vice President of Customer Success to Senior Vice President of Customer Operations, where he will continue to head up Critical Start’s customer experience efforts, including simplifying the onboarding and implementation process for new customers and the satisfaction of all customers.
