Michael Welts is Wasabi's Chief Marketing Officer and a member of the company's early founding team. Alongside the company's memorable and fun name, he helped to create the "hot cloud storage" category, a revolutionary approach that simplifies data storage and its cost for businesses worldwide. Michael drives the company's global marketing strategy and integrated marketing programs across brand, corporate communications, growth marketing, events and customer marketing.
Michael brings 30+ years of experience building global brands across a wide spectrum of high-growth technology companies, ranging from venture-backed startups to publicly traded global market leaders. He has held executive roles for companies at all stages of growth from seed/pre-revenue to hypergrowth, IPO, and turnarounds, including Aviatrix Systems, Plexxi, and Colubris Networks (both acquired by Hewlett-Packard), Castle Networks (acquired by Siemens), Bay Networks (acquired by Northern Telecom) and Cabletron Systems (Publicly traded, NYSE). During his various tenures, Michael oversaw the creation of dozens of market categories and breakthrough technologies, including the introduction of the 10BASE-T standard that revolutionized networking.
In addition to mentoring and advising numerous early-stage ventures, Michael serves as an Executive Committee Member of the Wasabi Fenway Bowl. He holds a BA in Mass Communications from Western Illinois University.