The Meru Team

Meru Networks was born from the vision of former computer science professor and current Meru CTO Vaduvur Bharghavan. While others saw wireless as a means to portability, Dr. Bharghavan foresaw the All-Wireless Enterprise: a world in which laptops replace desktops, cell phones replace landlines and people use 802.11 for their primary network connection. The team of 200+ who made this vision real is headed by President and CEO Ihab Abu-Hakima, a veteran executive who previously led innovation at companies ranging from small Internet startups to well-known names like Proxim and Silicon Graphics.

With a patented technology that customers of all sizes love, Meru has maintained exponential growth as it expands to a major industry force. CFO Brett White is charged with managing this expansion, bringing to Meru more than 20 years’ experience implementing financial controls at both private public and public companies. Customer feedback is essential to the company’s growth, with Meru constantly integrating new and innovative features based on marketplace demands. As SVP of corporate development and strategy, Kamal Anand ensures that this remains the case, setting the company’s overall direction. The industry increasingly recognizes Meru as a leader, thanks largely to the team led by senior VP of marketing Ram Appalaraju. As well as evangelizing Meru’s technical vision, he ensures that the company is able to meet the demands of the marketplace.

Meru’s expert technical sales staff builds close relationships with customers, helping at every stage of the wireless lifecycle. Senior VP of worldwide sales, service and support Glenn Cross leads the team charged with nurturing these relationships, working with customers to ensure that current and future products and services meet the needs of the marketplace. Meru has a strong international presence, with the global technical sales force led by VP of EMEA sales David Kelly. Previously responsible for growing the consumer wireless market more than tenfold at Linksys, he is now doing the same for enterprise customers in more than 30 countries.

Product architecture itself is the responsibility of Rachna Ahlawat, VP of product strategy and formerly a lead analyst for wireless at Gartner, Inc. Her experience helping enterprises choose the optimum wireless technology platform has given her an unparalleled insight into the needs of IT organizations. Customers are not the only industry stakeholders who want to do business with Meru. As a major contributor to industry standards that push technology forward, Meru attracts many partners. Responsibility for developing partnerships rests with VP of business development Sarosh Vesuna, formerly a Wi-Fi Alliance co-founder and co-author of the original 802.11 protocol. He makes sure that each partner’s solution is fully interoperable with Meru and that the combination adds real value for end users.

The company’s overall operations are directed by VP of operations Keith Matasci. An experienced manufacturing manager, he oversees Meru’s global supply chain and keeps the company running smoothly as Ihab and Bharghavan lead the company towards its long-term goal: enabling all enterprises to go all-wireless. To achieve this, Meru has a dedicated and diverse staff of more than 200 talented engineers and support staff, located at development and sales offices worldwide. With some of the industry’s most respected wireless experts, Meru is a frequent contributor to standards from the IEEE and Wi-Fi Alliance standards. Together, Meru’s staff developed Wireless LAN Virtualization, a technology combining the mobility of cellular, the performance of Ethernet and the flexibility of virtualization. Along with other Meru innovations in security, management and predictability, these make wireless like wire.