Leadership

Tom McAndrew is Chief Executive Officer for Coalfire. He is recognized as one of the world’s leading cybersecurity experts in both the commercial and government sectors. Mr. McAndrew joined Coalfire in 2006, and since that time, has held key leadership roles spanning Sales, Operations, Service Delivery, and Technical Testing, most recently serving as the company’s COO. Mr. McAndrew is focused on driving aggressive growth for the company’s strategic business units; under his leadership, Sales and Delivery teams have grown the business an average of 40+% annually over the past five years while supporting more than 2,000 customers annually.

During his time at Coalfire, he has established the vision and implemented new services to meet the growing challenges in cybersecurity in such areas as cloud computing, forensics, penetration testing, architecture, and cyber engineering, and expanded Coalfire’s compliance and assurance services. He has established Coalfire as the cyber security leader in a variety of industries including financial services, healthcare, government, payment processors, technology, and cloud. 

Prior to joining Coalfire, Mr. McAndrew had a distinguished career in information security and weapons systems for the Navy. He has worked for the Space and Naval Warfare Command, Office of Naval Intelligence, National Reconnaissance Office, Office of Naval Research, and has made deployments in support of overseas combat operations.  

He has received several awards in cybersecurity and leadership including being recognized as one of the top influencers in Federal IT (FCW Federal 100), 40 under 40 business leaders in Seattle, top senior security leaders in North America (ISC2), and has several certifications in cybersecurity.

He has served on several boards including start-ups, not for profit, and education. Mr. McAndrew is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, holds an MBA from the University of Washington, a Master of Science degree in Information Technology from the University of Maryland, and a Master’s certificate in Space Systems from the Naval Post-Graduate School.

Serving as President of Coalfire, Tom Galizia spearheads the expansion and scaling of the company’s operations. With over 30 years of industry expertise, Tom Galizia is renowned for his leadership in professional services and technology ecosystems. Most recently, Mr. Galizia served as US National Leader for Strategic Business and Platforms Growth at Deloitte, targeting, and accelerating existing and adjacent market opportunities. He was appointed to this role after successfully growing a $1 billion services business as Global Chief Commercial Officer of Alphabet Google.

Tom earned his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School with honors and a B.A. from Hamilton College with honors.

Bill Malone is the Coalfire Federal President and responsible for leading the Federal Government services practice within Coalfire. Mr. Malone is an accomplished executive with over 25 years’ experience leading people, servicing clients, and growing business within the Federal government market. He brings a unique combination of policy, technology, and mission expertise in IT and cybersecurity across the Federal government and commercial markets. He has served in leadership, operational, and business development roles in companies ranging from small businesses to midsized, publicly traded companies to a Fortune 50 company.

Prior to joining Coalfire, Bill was the President and COO of Tangible Security, Inc. Prior to that, he was an Executive Director and General Manager for Dell Services Federal Government. Bill is a former Naval Officer and holds a Master of Arts degree in International Affairs from Catholic University of America, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in History from the University of Rochester.

Rob Barnes has over twenty years of experience building and leading teams focused on solving clients’ toughest cybersecurity problems. He leads Coalfire’s strategic alignment and execution. Mr. Barnes is a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) and is also Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control (CRISC).

Merri Chandler is a financial executive that has spent over 25 years at professional services and technology companies.  Merri has held leadership positions at both private and publicly traded companies including Diamond Management Consultants, Trading Technologies, Huron Consulting Group and SilkRoad Technology.  Most recently she was the Chief Financial Officer at The Chartis Group, a strategic consulting firm advising healthcare providers, and is a current operating advisor to TeamBuilder, a technology company focused on staff scheduling for healthcare workers.  Merri began her career in public accounting working for KPMG, LLP and is a graduate of the University of Illinois with a Bachelors of Science degree in Accountancy.  Merri is a Certified Public Accountant. Merri enjoys fitness, the outdoors and spends much of her free time being active with her three children and husband in Chicago.

Chris Kloes is the Chief Revenue Officer at Coalfire. As a proven industry expert for over twenty years, he has held multiple senior leadership positions in operations, business development, and sales across leading cybersecurity, IT, SAAS, and technology organizations. Prior to joining Coalfire, Mr. Kloes served as a Vice President of Security Solutions at Unisys where he led go-to-market, pre-sales and professional services across the cybersecurity portfolio.

Mr. Kloes has always had an entrepreneurial spirit. Earlier in his career he owned and operated an IT services firm, Invisible IT, for ten years, culminating in a successful acquisition in 2010.

He holds a B.A. in Political Science and History from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and is based in Silicon Valley.

Vineet Seth is Chief Product & Technology Officer for Coalfire, responsible for leading global product, technology, and customer success functions for the company. Mr. Seth has over 25 years of experience building and leading high growth SaaS businesses in areas of cybersecurity, analytics, and digital eCommerce at multiple market-leading companies, and is passionate about building customer-engaged products.

Prior to joining Coalfire, Mr. Seth was Vice President of Product at BitSight Technologies, where he led the product and technology partner functions for the cybersecurity ratings leader. Previously, he also held business leadership roles at SAP, RSA, and i2 Technologies.

Mr. Seth holds a BTech in Manufacturing Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology Delhi and an MS in Manufacturing Science & Engineering from Boston University.

Camie Shelmire is a market-driven, C-suite operating executive recognized for transforming and growing technology businesses. She has a proven track record of shaping talent strategies and driving business outcomes with expedited growth.

A senior operations executive and client strategist with over 20 years’ experience driving growth for global organizations, she has created shareholder value for both private equity-owned and publicly listed companies, leading technology and engineering services firms through acquisition, integration, and successful sale. Her distinctive expertise lies in guiding go-to-market strategy and aligning operations, technology, sales, and HR to support scalability and client expansion.

Boasting a rich background in go-to-market strategy, sales transformation, post-acquisition integration, and HR leadership, Camie has been instrumental in successful organizational overhauls. Her impactful roles include serving as Chief Client Officer and Chief People Officer at Aricent, Senior Vice President of Client Success at Altran, Executive Vice President at Capgemini, and Chief People Officer at Brillio.

Camie earned her bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Political Science from Southern Methodist University. She is based in the Dallas/Fort Worth metro area.

Aparna Williams is an accomplished legal leader with over 20 years of experience scaling international legal teams in high growth private and public software companies. She successfully built and managed teams supporting sales and revenue, product development, compliance, and M&A in the cybersecurity industry. The breadth of her experience includes Software, SaaS, Hardware, Hosted Services, and Professional Services. Her focus has always been innovative solutions to match the pace of business without compromising quality.

She was the first in-house lawyer and Head of Legal at Shippo, a venture backed ecommerce company with a focus on API technology to facilitate courier services. She served as the Associate General Counsel- Corporate at Imperva, Inc., a privately held application security provider. She spent 19 years at Symantec Corporation, the world's largest public cybersecurity company at the time, working through the evolution of cybersecurity and it’s evolving threats and leading through the transformation from on-premises solutions to the cloud.

Aparna received her B.A. in Literature and History from the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) and a J.D. from the UNC Chapel Hill School of Law. Aparna is admitted to practice in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington DC. She is excited to be a board member of the Pride Hockey Association, fostering youth hockey for girls and propelling them into success in their education and sports careers.

Charles Henderson is a seasoned executive who specializes in leading teams that test, monitor, respond to, and secure organizations around the world. Throughout his career, Charles and the teams he has managed have specialized in threat intelligence, incident response, penetration testing, adversary simulation, vulnerability management, and vulnerability research. Formerly leading TrustWave SpiderLabs and IBM X-Force, his teams' clients range from governments, to the largest on the Fortune lists, to small and midsized companies interested in improving their security posture or in need of assistance handling a security incident.

Charles is also an enthusiastic member of the information security community and an advocate of vulnerability research. He serves on the BlackHat review board, has been a featured speaker at various conferences around the world on various subjects relating to security testing and incident response.(including Black Hat, DEFCON, RSA, and SXSW) He has also appeared on or in CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, The Today Show, CNN, BBC, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Forbes, USA Today, The Register, SC Magazine, Engadget, eWeek, Reuters, Car & Driver, and various other media outlets.

To be short, he runs a team of hackers.

Karen Laughton is Executive Vice President of Advisory Services. Throughout her extensive experience in IT security and compliance leadership roles, she has worked closely with government agencies as they shift towards cloud adoption and with cloud service providers as they endeavor to meet federal, state, and local government requirements. Ms. Laughton has compliance experience across the public and private sector, including within financial services, healthcare, and international markets.

Ms. Laughton partners with leaders in the technology industry to build their federal go-to-market strategy, determining the best and most cost-effective path for achieving their business goals. She and her team of dedicated cybersecurity professionals strive to improve the overall security posture of clients and navigate compliance with various standards such as FedRAMP, FISMA, Department of Defense (DoD) Cloud Computing Security Requirements Guide (SRG), NIST 800-171/CMMC, NIST CSF, HITRUST, ISO, SOC, and PCI.

Ms. Laughton earned her Bachelor of Science degree from Virginia Tech and serves on their Business Information Technology Advisory Board. She is active in our community through her work with the National Charity League and Young Men's Service League and served a five-year term on the board of the Isabella Santos Foundation, a pediatric cancer non-profit. Ms. Laughton holds industry certifications including Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA).

Adam Shnider is Executive Vice President of Compliance Services at Coalfire. He has extensive experience in information security leadership, including complete security program development, comprising organization, architecture and operations. Mr. Shnider also has considerable experience in audit and assessment planning and enterprise risk management. He has in-depth expertise serving clients in a wide variety of industries including technology, cloud service providers, healthcare, financial services, and retail.

Mr. Shnider has served hundreds of clients by helping them assess, design, and implement security programs to protect their businesses and products. He has also assisted clients in designing and implementing information security programs and architectures for a variety of industries, applications and platforms, including emerging technologies such as mobile, virtualization, and cloud computing. Prior to joining Coalfire, Mr. Shnider served in leadership roles in large public accounting firms and technology risk companies. He also served as Chief Information Security Officer, where he led the transformation and implementation of the cybersecurity program to identify and respond to emerging threats.

Mr. Shnider earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Ohio State University. He holds numerous industry certifications including Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) and Certified Information Security Manager (CISM).

Rohan Haldea is a partner at Apax Partners in the Tech & Telco team. Rohan joined Apax in 2007. He has both led and participated in a number of key deals including Coalfire, Fractal Analytics, ThoughtWorks, Grupo Engineering, EVRY, GlobalLogic, iGATE, Tivit S.A., NXP, and Orange Switzerland. Rohan currently serves as a director on the boards of Coalfire, Fractal Analytics, ThoughtWorks, and TietoEVRY. He also serves as co-CEO of the Apax Foundation and as a trustee of Impetus.

Prior to joining Apax Partners, Rohan worked at Bain Capital, where he focused on the industrial, distribution, and retail sectors. Prior to that, Rohan was a consultant at McKinsey.

Rohan holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.

Tom McAndrew is the Chief Executive Officer of Coalfire. He is a leading cybersecurity expert in cloud, compliance, and risk who frequently presents on cutting-edge cybersecurity challenges and innovative approaches to emerging threats. Tom has been with Coalfire since 2006 and has held key leadership roles across the company. He is passionate about education and serves on several educational boards at colleges and universities.

Tom began his career in the Navy, where he served as an Information Warfare Officer. While on active duty, he was deployed in support of overseas combat operations. He continues to serve as a Navy Reservist specializing in Space and Operational Level of War.

Tom is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, and holds an MBA from the University of Washington, an MS in Information Technology from the University of Maryland, and a Master’s certificate in Space Systems from the Naval Postgraduate School.

Homaira Akbari is President and CEO of AKnowledge Partners, LLC, a global strategy advisory firm providing services to leading private equity funds and large corporations in various technology sectors. She is currently the Chairman of WorkFusion, the leading provider of intelligent automation software, and serves on the Board of Directors of Banco Santander S.A. and Landstar System, Inc..

Dr. Akbari has held senior management roles in Fortune 1000 companies including Microsoft, Thales, and Liberty Media subsidiary, Trueposition. Dr. Akbari has served as the President and CEO of SkyBitz, Inc., a leading provider of remote asset tracking and security solutions. Under her leadership, the company had record performance.

She holds a Ph.D. with honors in particle physics from Tufts University and an MBA with distinction from Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business where she is currently a member of the Business Board of Advisors.

She is the author of more than 50 scientific articles in international journals, has two patents in IoT/M2M, and is a frequent speaker in industry conferences.

Mike Nefkens is a proven industry expert in technology, IT services, industrial manufacturing, and distribution. As former President and CEO of Resideo/Honeywell Homes, and former President of HPE Enterprise Services, Mike has experience running large service organizations with focus on enterprise cloud services and security services, along with leading efforts to successfully turn around the state of the business.
 
As a seasoned global executive, Mike has coached new CEOs, helping them to quickly find their pace and drive value with shareholders, employees and customers.  Mike has driven business turnarounds and has spoken multiple times at the World Economic Forum on cybersecurity.
 
Mike earned his MBA from Duke University and undergraduate degree from Texas Christian University. He served as a Board Member/Director of Riverbed Technologies until its sale in early 2015.  He also serves on Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business Board of Advisors.

Jim Pflaging is the managing partner at Cynergy Partners and has over 30 years of Silicon Valley experience. He served 15 years as CEO of cybersecurity and data management companies. Jim has a proven track record of translating cybersecurity and related technology, policy, and market dynamics into competitive advantage.

Jim currently serves as a director on the boards of several leading cybersecurity companies including Coalfire, Imperva, SailPoint, Secure Code Warrior, Sophos, and Veracode. He also serves as an investor or board director at several early stage technology firms.

Jesús Rueda is a Vice President at Apax Partners on the Tech & Telco team. He joined Apax Partners in 2015 and is currently based in London. Jesús has been involved in key deals including Grupo Engineering, Syneron Candela, ThoughtWorks and Trade Me. Jesús has spent most of his time at Apax working alongside tech services and cybersecurity companies, focused both on analyzing investment opportunities as well as accelerating profitable growth. Prior to joining Apax Partners, Jesús was a consultant at McKinsey & Company in their Madrid office, where he focused on Corporate Finance and Strategy across a variety of industries.

Jesús holds an MBA from Columbia Business School (with honors) and an MSc in Industrial Engineering from Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (summa cum laude).