IGEL Strengthens Leadership with Appointment of Ash Chowdappa as Chief Product & Development Officer
IGEL, a prominent global leader in secure endpoint delivery, Adaptive Secure desktop solutions, and the IGEL Secure Endpoint OS Platform, has announced a significant addition to its executive team. The company revealed that Ash Chowdappa has joined as Chief Product & Development Officer, marking the latest step in IGEL's strategic leadership expansion.
Strategic Leadership Expansion
This appointment represents a continuation of IGEL's focused investment in leadership talent to support its growing operations across various regions and business functions. Chowdappa will assume responsibility for overseeing IGEL's comprehensive product organization and engineering efforts. His role encompasses strategy development, product management, design initiatives, and execution oversight as IGEL continues to expand its global business footprint.
The company has been systematically strengthening key areas of its business over the past year. Notable appointments include Jeff Mitchell as Chief Revenue Officer and John Walsh as Field CTO for Critical Sectors. Additionally, IGEL has expanded its leadership presence in the EMEA region with the addition of Peter Goldbrunner as Vice President of Sales for the DACH region.
Global Growth and Expansion
These leadership changes coincide with substantial global expansion efforts. In 2025, IGEL increased its worldwide workforce by an impressive twenty percent. While some team members joined through the acquisition of Stratodesk, now integrated into IGEL, the majority of new positions resulted from organic growth initiatives.
The company has also extended its geographic reach, establishing a new office in Romania while accelerating expansion across both the United States and EMEA markets. This physical expansion complements the strategic leadership appointments, creating a comprehensive growth framework.
Executive Perspectives on the Appointment
Klaus Oestermann, Chief Executive Officer of IGEL, emphasized the strategic importance of this appointment. "As IGEL grows, we're making sure we have the right leadership in place to keep execution strong and always have customers at the center of everything we do," Oestermann stated. "Ash has spent his career building and scaling world-class product and engineering teams. He understands what it takes to deliver innovation that's practical and global in scope, secure, and built for the real-world needs of enterprise customers. We're thrilled to welcome him to IGEL."
Chowdappa brings extensive experience from previous senior leadership positions at Aruba Networks/HPE, Citrix, and ChargePoint. He has demonstrated proven capability in leading global business units that generate multi-billion-dollar revenue streams, managing teams operating across multiple countries. His expertise spans networking, security, cloud technologies, end-user computing, branch operations, and operational technology/internet of things solutions, along with enterprise-grade product innovation and delivery.
Chowdappa's Vision for IGEL
Ash Chowdappa expressed enthusiasm about joining IGEL at this pivotal moment. "IGEL has built a strong reputation for helping customers modernize endpoint computing securely—without adding complexity," said Chowdappa. "I'm excited to join at a time when the company is growing and investing in what's next. I'm looking forward to working with the product and engineering teams to keep raising the bar on the platform, how we deliver it, and the experience we provide to customers and partners."
IGEL's secure endpoint operating system is specifically designed to help organizations reduce total cost of ownership while simultaneously strengthening endpoint security measures. The platform represents a comprehensive solution for enterprises seeking to modernize their computing infrastructure without compromising security or increasing operational complexity.
