With more than 30 years in the technology services industry, Rodney Rogers is recognized as a successful serial entrepreneur and expert technologist, known for his leadership contributions in the realization of two back-to-back “unicorns” — startups that achieve billion-dollar valuations. Today, Rod operates as a founding partner of the Blue Lagoon Companies. Blue Lagoon, through its various entities, develops, advises and invests in disruptive technology start-ups and next-generation technology companies. Rod currently serves as Chairman of the Board for Lemongrass Ltd., and UnitedLex, Inc., as Lead Board Director for Beep, Inc., and as a Board Director for Agrematch Ltd.. Rod recently served on the Boards of New Signature, Inc. prior to its sale to Cognizant in 2020, and of Revenue Analytics, Inc. prior to its majority private equity sale in 2022.

 

Rod most recently led Virtustream, the enterprise-class cloud company trusted by organizations worldwide to run their mission-critical applications. He co-founded Virtustream in 2009 and was Chairman and CEO prior to its acquisition by EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) in 2015 for $1.2 billion. Virtustream’s acquisition marked one of the largest private technology start-up exits globally in 2015, and in that acquisition year, Virtustream and Rod ranked 3rd on the Forbes list of “Best Cloud Computing Companies and Best CEOs To Work For”. After the EMC acquisition, Virtustream became one of EMC’s four Federation operating companies with Rod as CEO reporting directly to the CEO of ~$24 billion EMC. In 2016, Dell Technologies acquired EMC for $60+ billion in the largest acquisition in the technology industry’s history. Rod then led Virtustream through its second successful post-merger integration in as many years, and ultimately on to become one of Dell Technologies’ seven ingredient brands. From 2016 until the time he retired in 2018, within Dell Technologies, Rod served as the President of the Virtustream business, a member of both the Dell EMC Infrastructure Solutions Group and Dell Services & Digital executive leadership teams, and as member of the Dell Technologies extended leadership team.

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Prior to Virtustream, Rod was co-founder, Chairman and CEO of Adjoined. From its inception in 2000 through its acquisition by Kanbay (NASDQ: KBAY) in 2006, Adjoined was known as one of the fastest growing US-based IT services companies in the industry, and its final cash/stock acquisition value of $235m reflected a premium multiple for a private IT services start-up in the post 2000-era. After the acquisition in 2006, Rod went onto become COO and SEC Section-16 Officer of Kanbay, a 7,000 person global IT Services firm, reporting directly to the CEO. In 2007, Kanbay was acquired by Capgemini SE (CAP: EN Paris) for $1.2 billion. After the acquisition, Rod became Managing Director of Capgemini’s East US Business and served on Capgemini’s US Country Managing Board until he retired from Capgemini in 2008.

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Prior to co-founding Adjoined in 2000, Rod started his career in 1988 at Andersen Consulting, known today as Accenture. Rod worked for the firm developing and implementing software technologies in the manufacturing and distribution industries. He was an early promote to manager in 1992, and was elected to a variety of firmwide leadership committees by the time he left in 1994 to work directly for one of his clients, Florida Crystals Corporation (FCC). FCC is one the largest producers of consumer and industrial sweeteners in the world, and, at just 28 years old, Rod was hired to run FCC’s Consumer Products Division as its General Manager, which he continued to do until he co-founded Adjoined in 2000. FCC has remained a customer of Rod’s for 25+ years— from Accenture, to Adjoined, through Kanbay, Capgemini, Virtustream, EMC and Dell Technologies.

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Rod has been the recipient of numerous technology industry awards including being a 3-time E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year finalist, an Intel Capital Entrepreneur/Exit of the Year winner, and an American Business Awards CEO winner. Rod is co-inventor of US Patent 8,799,920 B2: “Systems and Methods of Host-Aware Resource Management Involving Cluster-Based Resource Pools”, is an angel investor and advisor to a variety of technology startups and is co-founder and Board Director of The Blue Lagoon Foundation, a non-profit charitable giving organization. Rod is an often invited speaker at leading technology and financial industry events, and has been both the subject and author of numerous technology industry-related articles and publications: Rod's Wikipedia Page.

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Rod holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial & Systems Engineering from the University of Florida. Rod and his wife Judith are the establishers of the Rodney & Judith Rogers Entrepreneurial Excellence Endowment for the University of Florida’s Warrington School of Business, and Rod serves on the Advisory Board of the University of Florida’s Innovate Ventures Fund. In 2020 Rod was awarded the University of Florida’s prestigious Distinguished Alumnus Award in recognition of his “achievements, demonstrated service, and exceptional leadership”.