Leadership

Andre Durand

Chief Executive Officer

Andre Durand founded Ping Identity in 2002 with a mission to secure the internet through identity. Ping (NYSE:PING) is a leading provider of enterprise identity security serving more than half of the Fortune 100 and protecting over 3 billion identities. Andre founded the identity industry conference, Identiverse, to accelerate the adoption of identity and serve as a community resource for professionals serving the identity industry. Prior to Ping Identity, Durand founded Jabber to commercialize the Jabber open source instant messaging platform which was acquired by Cisco in 2008. Durand serves on the board of Jamf (NASDAQ: JAMF) and in his spare time focuses on causes related to children in the foster care system, building great culture and creating opportunities for entrepreneurs. Durand holds a BA in Biology and Economics from the University of California at Santa Barbara and lives in Denver, Colorado, with his wife Kim and two daughters.

Kris Nagel

Chief Operating Officer

Kris comes to Ping after a 30-year-long proven track record spanning engineering, operations and sales, during which he built and led fast-moving technology organizations with a specific focus on revenue growth and organizational scaling. For global brands like Apple, Portal Software (acquired by Oracle) and Vindicia (Amdocs), he's held senior leadership positions in both venture-backed and public companies from pre-revenue to $4.5B in annual sales, and from early funding to in excess of $10B in market capitalization. Kris has run global businesses providing diverse enterprise software and SaaS solutions to multiple industries including media and entertainment, enterprise, manufacturing, financial services and telecom. Kris earned his MBA from San Jose State University and his Bachelor of Science in Management Information Systems at Penn State University. In his spare time, you can catch Kris enjoying his family, spreading his car fanaticism or finding any excuse to spend time outdoors.

Raj Dani

Chief Financial Officer

Prior to joining Ping, Raj served as CFO of Florida-based systems integration firm AVI-SPL. During his AVI-SPL tenure, he worked to grow and manage the company through its successful sale, earning him recognition as 2016 CFO of the Year by the Tampa Bay Business Journal in the Large Private Company category.

Raj has also held senior financial positions within technology services companies like Flextronics, Jabil Circuit and TeleTech. He began his career with PwC, serving in the audit and transaction advisory practices for over nine years, and his global experience spans both public and private companies, including long-term assignments in Switzerland and Italy. Raj received a bachelor's degree in business administration from Emory University and a master's degree in accounting from the University of Florida. He is an actively licensed CPA.

Aaron LaPoint

Chief Human Resources Officer

Aaron joined Ping after most recently working in the telecommunications industry at DISH Network. There, he led a national human resources team that supported almost 20,000 employees. Aaron's broad HR experience spans talent acquisition, leadership development, employee advocacy, total rewards and HR strategy. He's held HR positions with EchoStar Communications and multiple healthcare companies in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, and his roles focused on building centers of excellence for various HR functions. Aaron grew up in the Minneapolis area and received a Bachelor's of Business Administration with an emphasis on Human Resources from the University of Minnesota.

Shalini Sharma

Chief Legal Officer

Shalini is a seasoned legal professional with more than 23 years of international corporate legal experience and 15 years of global financial technology expertise. Prior to joining Ping, she served as SVP and General Counsel at Vantage Data Centers where she oversaw legal and corporate governance and compliance matters during a period of expansive international growth. Sharma joined Vantage from Broadridge Financial Solutions (NYSE: BR), a leading fintech solutions company, where she was Assistant General Counsel and Chief Privacy Officer, serving the global financial services industry. Previously, she was in private practice as a corporate transactional attorney at Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle LLP in New York. Sharma holds a B.A. and M.A. from the University of Chicago and a J.D. from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law. She is also a recipient of a Fulbright Award. Outside of work, Shalini is an avid reader, cook, wanna-be yogi and can also be found planning her next travel adventure with her kids.

Bernard Harguindeguy

Senior Vice President, Special Projects

Bernard joined Ping by way of the Elastic Beam acquisition, where he was the founder and CEO. Elastic Beam built the first hybrid cloud solution that used advanced AI techniques to deliver deep visibility into API activity and stop cyberattacks. Most recently he was Chairman, President and CEO at Atlantis Computing (award-winning storage optimization software) and the CEO of Green Border which was acquired by Google. Bernard was also the Chairman of Booshaka acquired by Sprinkler, Chairman of Norskale acquired by Citrix, Chairman of BorderWare acquired by WatchGuard, Board Member at Sygate Technologies acquired by Symantec. Bernard earned an MS in Engineering Management from Stanford University and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of California Irvine where he was inducted into the Engineering Hall of Fame..

Ed Roberto

General Manager, Cloud Software

Ed joins Ping with 37 years of proven track record under his belt, working with blue chip, private equity and venture capital financed companies across several countries. He's an energetic technology business leader who's held diverse strategic roles including Advisor to Techstars, Advisor and Board Member at DRINKS Holding, CEO at Collective Intellect, Advisor to the Bahrain Economic Development Bank and others. Ed's early accomplishments include building kernel mode applications in assembler code for manufacturing, telecommunications and defense industry customers. His diverse technology and business-building experience enables him to quickly develop and execute strategic and operational priorities that produce the greatest impacts. Ed holds an MBA from the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver, and he studied electrical and mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado. Outside of work, he enjoys motorsports, combat shooting, martial arts and digital and underwater photography.

Kevin Sellers

Chief Marketing Officer

Kevin joins Ping with more than 20 years of global marketing leadership experience in the technology sector. His passion for strategic marketing combines storytelling and partnerships across brand leadership, demand generation, digital marketing and transformation and corporate communications. Prior to Ping, Kevin served as chief marketing officer at Avnet, where he oversaw the company’s business-to-business strategies and orchestrated significant digital transformation efforts across the entire marketing organization. He also held multiple leadership positions at Intel, where he led the historic re-branding that took Intel beyond its core personal computer market. Kevin has been recognized in the industry as one of B2B Magazine’s Top Digital Marketers, and he’s won multiple Cannes Lions, as well as ADDY and Effie awards for creative excellence. He holds a BA in Finance and an MBA from Brigham Young University. Outside of work, Kevin enjoys live music, running outdoors and traveling the world with his wife and four grown children checking things off his bucket list—next stop: scuba diving in the Red Sea.

Candace Worley

Chief Product Officer

Candace joins Ping by way of Amazon Web Services (AWS) where she served as Director of Enterprise Strategists and Vertical Marketing, managing the development of AWS messaging and marketing plans for industry and C-level business decision makers. She also spent 19 years with McAfee (and Intel Corporation during acquisition) where she held roles ranging from General Manager of the Endpoint Business Unit to VP of Product Marketing and Chief Technical Strategist. Candace brings a wide range of skills in product management, customer engagement, cross-functional collaboration, product and business strategy and P&L oversight. Candace holds a Bachelor of Science in Management from Oregon State University and an MBA from Marylhurst University. She lives in Oregon on a hazelnut farm with her husband and two black labs, and outside of work you can find her checking off her travel bucket list and spending time in her flower and vegetable gardens.

John Cannava

Senior Vice President, Chief Information Officer

John joined Ping in 2013 after serving as the Vice President of Technology Strategy and IT Business Capabilities at TTEC. He brings over 20 years of experience leading high-performance teams delivering rapid growth through strategic planning, business transformation and operational execution in support of all enterprise functions. At Ping, he previously served as the Vice President of Technology & Strategic Programs where he directed Ping's IT Strategy and Business Enablement, led successive business transformations and built Ping's first enterprise Strategic Programs organization. Outside of work, John enjoys skiing, mountain biking and trail running with his wife. He's a lifetime learner, live music lover and the biggest fan of his son's sports teams.

Patrick Harding

Chief Product Architect

A distinguished identity leader, Patrick is actively involved in the identity standards community and is a former board member of the Information Card Foundation and the Open Identity Exchange as well as a co-creator of the SCIM standard. From 2005 to 2018, Patrick served as Ping’s original Chief Technology Officer . After two years of advisory and consulting work in the blockchain and identity space, including work at Hedera Hashgraph, he remained a trusted advisor before formally rejoining the Ping team. He oversees the development and maintenance of Ping’s strategic vision, identity standards efforts and product architecture. He also supports the sales, marketing, business development, and corporate development teams. Outside of work Patrick enjoys CrossFit and golf as a way to keep up with his teenage kids—and to not be beaten too badly by his youngest daughter at tennis.

Jason Wolf

Chief Revenue Officer

Jason joins the Ping executive team as a seasoned sales executive with nearly two decades of experience to support ongoing growth in enterprise sales, cloud channel development and long-term customer success. Most recently, he served as the chief revenue officer at SAP overseeing the Spend Management and Network line of business. Jason oversees Ping Identity’s global team of worldwide sales and revenue, channels, customer success, operations and enablement, leveraging his in-depth experience with go-to-market strategy, sales performance, customer success and operations of global field organizations. Outside of work you will find Jason at a sporting event cheering on one of his 3 kids, outside with the dogs, or enjoying time in the country. Outside of work you will find Jason at a sporting event cheering on one of his 3 kids, outside with the dogs, or enjoying time in the country.

Jason Kees

Chief Information Security Officer

Jason joins Ping as a seasoned information security leader with a track record of developing cybersecurity strategies for large enterprises and managing best-in-class security teams. With more than 20 years of experience in the security domain, Jason most recently served as vice president and chief information security officer at Groupon, where he built the enterprise security organization from the ground up and had oversight for the popular online marketplace’s IT and engineering operations teams. Prior to Groupon, Jason served as director of information security at CBS Interactive, where he owned the information security strategy, security compliance and incident response programs. He began his career as a network security leader for McAfee, which ultimately advanced into senior management roles at Siebel and Oracle.

Senior Vice President, Customer Care

Craig joins Ping with over 20 years of experience in managing direct sales, software sales, and customer service management organizations with SaaS at the forefront. His extensive leadership experience includes enterprise sales, sales strategy development and execution, customer success and SaaS renewals, commercial operational management, strategic consulting, and direct sales with Crownpeak, Lithium Technologies, North Plains Systems, and SAP Ariba. Craig holds a BBA in Business Information Systems from the University of West Georgia. Out of the office, Craig spends his time on the coast with his family (Kristi, Parker, Campbell, and Anderson), fishing, and volunteering.

Chief Development Officer

Rakesh brings over 25 years of engineering leadership experience having successfully led technology organizations at various private and public companies in hypergrowth, sustaining growth, and turnaround phases. Most recently, Rakesh was Vice President of Enterprise networking at Cisco leading a portfolio that delivered $3B+ in annual sales. Prior to that, Rakesh held leadership roles at Gigamon, Blue Coat, and Dell where he transformed and scaled diverse teams across the world building enterprise-class SaaS, security, and networking products. Rakesh has a proven track record of driving innovation while building a culture of operational excellence, agility, and sharp customer focus. In his free time, Rakesh loves to photograph nature, go on long walks, and read. He also enjoys meeting new people and trying new cuisines.

Chief Identity Champion

I know what you’re all thinking. Wait, that guy works for Ping Identity now? Not exactly. But I am helping Ping spread their message to the world. See, Ping and I share a common belief that you should be able to embrace your unique identity, fully and confidently, whether you’re an individual or an enterprise. And in the digital world, your uniqueness shouldn’t slow you down. It should be what gives you an edge and sets you free. That’s what it means to champion identity. How can we champion you?