World Wide Technology (WWT) and VAST Data, the data platform company for the AI era, have announced that Omar Mir, WWT President, has been appointed as Senior Advisor for VAST Data EMEA. With significant subject matter expertise in AI and a deep understanding of the EMEA market, Omar brings a wealth of knowledge that aligns perfectly with VAST Data’s commitment to driving innovation in the newly started AI era.
Omar is a tech industry veteran with decades of international experience and has served in his role with WWT for nearly nine years, driving customer strategy in 5G, AI, cybersecurity, networking and more. In his role as Senior Advisor, Omar will drive VAST Data forward to further disrupt the AI landscape globally, explore new markets and leverage his insights to propel the company to the forefront of the AI era.
The move will also enable WWT and VAST Data to expand their ongoing global partnership by combining VAST’s AI infrastructure excellence with WWT’s world-leading AI enablement and acceleration capabilities including in WWT’s Advanced Technology Centre (ATC), one of the world’s largest multi-OEM technology R&D labs.
“AI innovation will underline the human impact of the future, and we’re already seeing this in one of the most advanced AI markets, the UAE,” said Mir. “I’m proud to be driving transformational change with organisations in the entire EMEA market and believe the positive impact that technology can have on education, diversity, healthcare, and climate action is limitless. I am thrilled to be joining the team at VAST and excited about what we will achieve together.”
“There’s no doubt that AI will transform the world at a fundamental level,” added Renen Hallak, co-founder & CEO of VAST Data. “AI will solve problems in the natural world that we have been unable to. But for this to become a reality, powerful data platforms are essential to ensuring that conventional challenges don’t hinder innovation and growth. In his role as Senior Advisor for VAST Data EMEA, Omar is perfectly positioned to support us in bringing cutting-edge data infrastructure to clients looking to leverage the transformative power of artificial intelligence.”
Several EMEA markets have demonstrated a significant commitment to embracing AI and deep learning technologies to meet various development goals and aspirations. The AI market in the Middle East and North Africa alone is expected to grow from $500 million in 2020 to $8.4 billion by 2026 according to findings by research firm Research & Markets.
The VAST Data Platform unifies storage, database, and containerised compute engine services into a single, scalable software platform architected from the ground up to power AI and GPU-accelerated tools in modern data centres and clouds. VAST Data is enabling data driven organisations to accelerate time-to-insight for their workload-intensive applications, delivering immense value from their AI deployments. The performance, scalability, ease of use and cost efficiencies of VAST’s solutions enable enterprise customers to overcome the historic barriers to building modern data centres that are equipped to handle the rigours of AI initiatives.
As a result of its innovative solutions and flexible offerings, VAST is the fastest-selling data infrastructure company in history. The company recently announced a Series E funding round of $118 million, nearly tripling its valuation in over two years, to $9.1 billion. At the end of FY’Q3 (Oct 31, 2023), VAST Data surpassed $1 billion in cumulative software bookings. The company achieved 3.3x year-over-year (YoY) growth and maintained positive cash flow for the last twelve quarters. With an average deal size of more than $1M and 100% of its customers recommending VAST to their peers, VAST continues to demonstrate success across every aspect of its business.
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