Leadership

At Elastic, we see endless possibilities in a world of endless data. As CEO of Elastic, Ash Kulkarni’s priority is to drive innovation, and he has the pleasure of working with the bright minds at Elastic to create products and solutions that use the power of search to help its customers and community turn possibilities into results. Ash joined Elastic as chief product officer in 2021 and prior to that held senior product leadership and management roles at McAfee, Akamai, Informatica, and Sun Microsystems. He and his family live in San Francisco and enjoy hiking, skiing, and exploring national parks in their free time.

As a founder of Elastic and CTO, Shay Banon has been fascinated with search ever since he tried to build a recipe app for his wife in 2004, a journey that led to him writing the first few lines of code of Elasticsearch in 2009 and later founding Elastic in 2012. Shay believes finding beauty and excelling is a combination of perspective and grit. As someone who got into computers by counting the number of job postings in the newspaper, he loves building things—a product, a community, or a company and the process of acquiring the knowledge to do so.

I've always been attracted to companies in the build stage, and Elastic has enjoyed great success to date, positioned at the forefront of Search AI. With tremendous product innovation and a large market opportunity ahead, I'm excited to contribute to the journey of creating the most trusted company in search, observability, and security for our customers.

As Elastic's Chief Financial Officer, I am responsible for Accounting, Strategic Finance, Internal Audit, and Investor Relations. Before joining Elastic, I was the CFO of Grammarly and HashiCorp. In addition to holding various finance leadership roles scaling technology companies, I've also held investment roles at Insight Venture Partners, American Capital Strategies, and Sierra Ventures.

I hold a bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Dartmouth College. I'm originally from Sri Lanka, and now call California my home, where I live with my wife and two kids. As a family, we love to travel and explore new places worldwide.

Elastic plays a defining role in how organizations harness all their data to power AI with context, and our ability to lead in this new era depends on how we enable our people and our systems to move with clarity, speed, and impact. What makes Elastic special isn’t just the technology, it's the people and infrastructure that enable innovation at scale. I’m proud to lead both our People and IT organizations as we continue building an environment where Elasticians can do the best work of their careers with the tools, systems, and culture to match.

I have more than 20 years of HR and organizational leadership experience in high-scale environments, including leadership roles in IBM’s consulting business and talent organization. Prior to joining Elastic, I served as Vice President of Total Rewards at IBM, where I led the global design and delivery of compensation, benefits, and health & safety programs for over 300,000 employees.

I hold both a Bachelor's degree in International Relations and an MBA from Syracuse University. Originally from Syracuse, NY, I now live in Austin, TX with my fiancé. I'm passionate about travel and staying connected with my family. Our annual reunions now require serious logistical planning, which feels on-brand for leading People and IT.

At Elastic, our customers, our community, are at the heart of everything we do. Our passion for our users translates into their passion for Elastic. As Chief Revenue Officer, I’m responsible for the success of our customers, partners and the company by leading our teams in sales, customer success, services, solutions architecture, and partner engagement. I’m joining Elastic after 23 years at Cisco Systems, and prior to that, at IBM and SCANA Corporation. While at Cisco, I most recently focused on accelerating the company’s transformation to recurring revenue. I had the opportunity to work with some of the largest strategic clients, spanning many vertical markets, including Global Financial Services, Manufacturing, Retail, Oil & Gas and Healthcare. I’m passionate about giving back and currently serve on the board of Covenant House International and the marketing advisory board for Clemson University’s College of Business. Over the years, I’ve also served on various boards and committees for the American Heart Association, American Cancer Society, Boys & Girls Clubs, and the Cisco Foundation.

My wife and I have 2 amazing kids, and an adorable dog. For fun, I enjoy reading, golfing, watching college football and playing cards, and I am a graduate of Clemson University – Go Tigers!

An orchestra is a team of musicians that has infinite opportunities to interpret and create music to inspire an audience. So too does Elastic’s legal team work together to provide innovative and simple solutions to new and complex problems, enabling operational excellence and ease of business for our customers. This is my priority, and I am proud and privileged to lead this diverse and dispersed organization as we continue to learn, grow and thrive.

Prior to Elastic, I was the General Counsel at Arm Ltd. and held senior leadership roles at Symantec Corporation, which acquired AXENT Technologies, Inc. where I was General Counsel. Prior to this, I worked in the international development sector, both at a nonprofit and for the World Bank, in the Africa Department.

I have lived and worked in various places across the U.S. and in Europe. I have a J.D. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a B.A. from Washington University in St. Louis, MO.

Outside of the office, I love traveling, listening to music and exploring the arts, hiking with the dog and spending time with my family. I live in San Jose with my husband, two terrific kids, and our furry friends.

Great marketing tells stories that matter — stories that inspire, inform, and build trust. At Elastic, I have the privilege of leading an incredible global marketing and communications team that brings those stories to life every day, fueling growth, accelerating pipeline, and connecting our brand with customers and our community around the world.

Before joining Elastic, I held marketing leadership roles at Palo Alto Networks, NetApp, and Cisco, where I focused on building strong teams, scaling demand, and helping customers navigate transformation.

I'm originally from the UK and now based in California, where life is full and joyful thanks to my husband, son, four stepdaughters, and our many adventures together.