Daniel Ryan Joins Split Rock Partners as an Entrepreneur in Residence

MINNEAPOLIS, March 15, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Split Rock Partners, a venture capital firm focused on emerging software and internet services companies, is pleased to announce that Daniel Ryan, former Executive Vice President and General Manager of the Network Security unit of McAfee, Inc., is affiliated with the firm as an Entrepreneur in Residence ("EIR").

Ryan joined McAfee in 2008 when it acquired Secure Computing for $465M. As president, chief executive officer, and director of Secure Computing, he was responsible for the $250M industry leader in enterprise network and gateway security solutions, which included the pioneering web security delivered as-a-service offering.

Prior to Secure Computing, he was senior vice president of enterprise content management products at Oracle after their acquisition of Stellent in 2006 for $440M. Ryan served as president and chief operating officer at Stellent, which became an industry leader in enterprise content management during his tenure, growing from $2M to approximately $130M at the time of the acquisition.

Ryan came to Stellent from Foglight Software, a venture-funded startup and an early innovator in e-commerce and multi-tier application performance management that was ultimately acquired by Quest Software. At Foglight, he was the vice president of marketing and business development, which marked just one of a variety of marketing, product management, sales, and business development roles he has held during his career.  Ryan also has strong experience in mergers and acquisitions, having executed several acquisitions for Stellent and Secure as well as driving the acquisition and integration of each into Oracle and McAfee respectively.

"Dan is an accomplished executive and brings great experience to the process of translating compelling technologies into leading businesses.  From his roles at Stellent, Secure Computing and McAfee, Dan has developed insights regarding the range of challenges facing global enterprises and the opportunity to solve them through the combination of novel technologies and cloud-based delivery models," said Michael Gorman, a Managing Director at Split Rock Partners.  "Dan has played a key role in building companies that became leaders in their respective markets - we look forward to working with Dan as he applies those insights to a new opportunity."

As an EIR with Split Rock Partners, Ryan will be evaluating a broad range of opportunities including enterprise security and cloud services.  "I am excited to explore how new technologies and delivery models can meet the evolving needs of enterprise customers.  There remain important business problems in need of elegant technical solutions, and the evolution of the cloud as a computing platform opens up a world of opportunities.  I am excited to work with the Split Rock team to pursue them."

About Split Rock Partners

Split Rock Partners, with offices in Minneapolis and Menlo Park, seeks emerging opportunities in software, Internet services and healthcare, primarily in the Upper Midwest and West Coast. Since 2005, Split Rock has raised $575 million over two funds.  Representative software and internet services companies backed by Split Rock's team include 8thBridge, Amcom, eBureau, Guardian Analytics, HireRight, LowerMyBills.com, MyNewPlace, QuinStreet and SPS Commerce. Additional information about the firm can be found at www.splitrock.com .

SOURCE Split Rock Partners