Colsted’s appointment is effective as of July 1, 2013, and he joins the Denmark-based company from Microsoft, where he spent four-plus years as its senior director of EMEA region specialist sales for enterprise customers.
Secunia, having been in business for a little over a decade, is a provider of vulnerability intelligence and patch management solutions, and according to a company statement, the board’s choice of Colsted as new CEO “signals Secunia’s intention to accelerate growth and international expansion”.
Colsted joined Microsoft in 2000 as director of the Enterprise & Partner Group in Denmark, subsequently garnering several leadership positions both in Denmark and at Microsoft HQ in Redmond, Washington. With a master’s of science in forestry, Colsted’s first professional stints came within the timber industry, before moving on to IT in 1993. The new Secunia CEO also holds a bachelor’s in economics and IT.
“We are very excited to bring on a leader of Peter Colsted’s caliber”, said Jesper Johansen, chairman of Secuina’s board, in a press release statement. “With his years of executive management and leadership experience in the international IT industry, I am confident that Peter is the right person to lead and define Secunia moving forward.”
The firm currently employs 130 people and looks to expand its international footprint. In 2013, Secunia opened a US office in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and it counts among its largest revenue sources customers from the EMEA and North America regions, the US and Germany being its largest markets to date.
“Secunia is a fantastic company with a great technology, and is renowned in the industry for the uncompromising quality of its research”, Colsted said in a statement. “The offerings of the company perfectly match the needs of the fast-growing, global vulnerability management market”.