Why I’m Joining Coalesce to Help Shape the Future of Data in APJ

Taking the natural next step in a career focused on solving hard problems with innovative technology

When thinking about my career over time, one thing I realise is that I have always been passionate about identifying new technologies that solve underserved needs and help address significant unsolved problems. I’ve tended to gravitate toward technologies that not only make a big impact on the companies that adopt them, but also help individual people make progress, drive productivity, and do more meaningful work in their own careers.

I’ve been fortunate to spend more than a decade at two innovative companies that have done just this: Tableau and Smartsheet. Now, I see the same potential with Coalesce. People who use Coalesce spend less time doing mundane grunt work and more time working on higher-order initiatives that drive valuable business outcomes. And that ultimately helps those people develop their careers and become more valuable to their organisations.

This is why I’m so excited to have recently joined Coalesce as the new General Manager for the Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) region.

 

From curiosity to conviction

I was first introduced to the company by a couple of former Tableau colleagues who are now working with Coalesce. Around that same time, I connected with a partner at one of the company’s investors, Titanium Ventures. That’s when I first started to take a closer look at the company and the problems it was solving, and what I saw intrigued me.

When it came time to meet the people at Coalesce, I asked to meet with the founders, the executive team, the people I’d be partnering with if I took on the role, and even the investors and board members. I wanted to be sure I was joining an organisation with the right kind of guidance and leadership, not to mention a good personality fit with the people I’d be working closely with and relying on.

I walked away from those meetings with a strong sense that Coalesce was the right fit for me. One big moment of validation was talking with Satish Jayanthi, the CTO and Co-Founder of Coalesce, about his strategy and the company’s product roadmap. I was totally energised by his vision for the future, both for the company and the industry. He’s thinking way beyond where we are today.

I also saw there was an enormous market opportunity. I was excited about the recent acquisition of CastorDoc (now Coalesce Catalog) and how this AI-powered data catalog enhanced Coalesce’s product portfolio. In addition, there was Coalesce’s recent announcement that it now supports multiple platforms, adding Databricks and Microsoft Fabric to its initial support of Snowflake. All of that signaled a much broader opportunity and a chance to help a lot more customers.

But the final factor that sealed the deal for me was a personal conversation with Coalesce customer Cyril Lam, the CIO of Moose Toys, who had glowing things to say about not just Coalesce’s technology, but also about the people, leadership and team members alike. You can meet with people on the inside of an organisation, and of course many of them will only have positive things to say. But hearing directly from a customer that I know and trust? After that conversation, I was 100% certain that Coalesce was an organisation I wanted to be a part of.

 

Why I’m excited to join Coalesce

One of the things that has given me great satisfaction throughout my career is identifying technology solutions that have an already established product-market fit, typically in markets such as North America or Europe, and then helping bring those innovations to the APJ region. Businesses in this part of the world are often the last to benefit from new technologies, even though this region includes some of the fastest-growing economies in the world and represents a significant portion of the global population.

I’ve helped several overseas headquartered organisations start up virtually from scratch in the APJ region, being one of the first people on the ground building the brand, developing a category, building out the team and partner ecosystem, establishing a customer base, and creating a user community. Along with very talented and passionate teams, I’ve driven that journey all the way to the point where those businesses became category leaders in APJ. It takes a lot of hard work and a collective effort, but it’s incredibly fulfilling and I’m excited to undertake that journey again with Coalesce.

If I was to summarise why I think Coalesce is such a game-changing organisation at the forefront of the data industry, I would say:

Category-defining innovation in data transformation: Coalesce is tackling one of the most critical pain points in modern data architecture: transforming raw data into business and AI-ready data at scale. The platform’s unique combination of automation, governance, and flexibility resonates with the future of enterprise data operations.

Strong product-market fit with massive headroom: The company has already seen significant traction with forward-thinking data teams in North America. That validation gives me confidence we’re solving a real, high-value problem, one that’s equally relevant to enterprises in APJ.

Right company, right time: We’re at an inflection point in the data ecosystem. As enterprises modernise their data stacks, adopt innovative cloud data platforms like Snowflake and Databricks, and dive into AI-first strategies, the demand for more scalable, maintainable, and governed data is accelerating.

 

A region full of potential

I see so much opportunity and potential for Coalesce to expand its business in APJ. Like many places around the world, adoption of cloud data platforms is booming. But while there’s a strong foundation already, businesses in the region also face some big challenges.

The need for better data governance has been evident for years, and it’s only becoming more urgent with the explosion of data, especially with AI and related tools. Organisations are under growing pressure to ensure their data is high quality and well governed, especially in regulated sectors like finance, telco, healthcare, and government. At the same time, they can’t afford to be hamstrung when it comes to getting data pipelines business-ready. They need to unlock the value of their data in a mature, scalable way. Coalesce’s built-in governance capabilities offer a strategic advantage in these environments.

There’s also a widespread data engineering skills shortage in the APJ region, which presents a real opportunity for companies like Coalesce to help these organisations think differently. Coalesce’s low-code, automation-driven approach helps enterprises do more with leaner teams, which is a major win in this market. A big part of my career has been challenging the status quo and showing people there’s a better way, a simpler way to work. That small shift can unlock huge productivity gains.

“A big part of my career has been challenging the status quo and showing people there’s a better way, a simpler way to work. That small shift can unlock huge productivity gains.”

 

The value of partners

APJ markets are incredibly diverse and fragmented. There are time zone differences, language differences, diverse cultures, different regulatory environments and economic challenges, all of which affect the way businesses are run. But despite all that, the desired outcomes of organisations across the region are remarkably similar: they want to leverage data to improve productivity, generate insights, and deliver better outcomes for their customers.

This is where the partner and alliance community becomes essential. In fact, I’d argue a strong partner ecosystem is more critical in APJ than in any other region because they help us navigate the complexities I touched on earlier and deliver success for our joint customers.

I’ve spent a good part of my career working on partner and alliance strategy, and have in multiple organisations been responsible for the entire APJ partner ecosystem. So I’m confident I’ve got a good sense of what it takes to make those relationships work. There’s a great opportunity at Coalesce to build strategic alliances with cloud platforms, global and regional SIs, and specialist data consultancies to accelerate adoption and implementation. If we can get this right, we will create a winning formula that unlocks real scale and success.

 

Sydney to San Francisco: The journey begins

I started my new role at Coalesce with a bang, flying to San Francisco to attend Snowflake Summit 2025 in the first week of June, where I was excited to meet many of my new colleagues, Coalesce customers, and partners in person. Snowflake certainly put on an incredible event and it was great to connect with so many of their team members who were such wonderful hosts, especially those that travelled from the APJ region. It was also fantastic to run into a number of folks I hadn’t seen since my Tableau days, many of whom are wearing different hats today but are still amongst the best of the best in the industry.

And if I needed any additional validation that I had joined an exciting company that’s solving important problems for customers, seeing the animated reactions during the countless demos I witnessed at the Coalesce booth at the event left me in no doubt at all that the future is very bright!

I’m looking forward to our continued growth and expansion in the APJ region, and helping more organisations solve their biggest data challenges with Coalesce’s innovative approach. If you’re interested in what we’re building or want to collaborate in the region, I’d love to connect.