Viswesh Ananthakrishnan

About Viswesh Ananthakrishnan

Viswesh Ananthakrishnan is a visionary product leader and the co-founder of Aurascape AI, a pioneering company at the forefront of revolutionizing cybersecurity in the AI era. With a career spanning over three decades, Viswesh has held transformative leadership roles in engineering and product management in the areas of networking, security, and artificial intelligence. His efforts have consistently introduced many \'first-of-its-kind\' products that have advanced the technology frontier and delivered compelling value to customers.Before co-founding Aurascape AI in 2024, Viswesh conceived, developed, and launched the industry’s first domain-centric AIOps solution for NGFWs, at Palo Alto Neworks. AIOps leverages firewall telemetry to prevent HW/SW failures and helps maintain healthy operations. Viswesh\'s journey in AI innovation began at Niara, a trailblazing UEBA startup, where he shaped the foundational feature set and led numerous successful engagements with Fortune 500 companies, setting the stage for its acquisition by Aruba Networks. Viswesh\'s role as a pioneer gained momentum at FireEye, where he led the development of the company\'s initial cloud offering, ‘Email Threat Prevention’. He drove the strategic acquisition of SecureDNA, integrated with advanced technology from FireEye\'s ETP with additional features secured through various licensing deals. He also fostered the creation of Mandiant\'s \'Threat Analytics Platform\', marking one of the industry’s first applications of machine learning to threat analytics.Prior to focussing on security and AI, Viswesh accumulated over 15 years of valuable experience at Juniper Networks, leading the development of 3 generations of the Internet Processor, the workhorse of Juniper’s flagship M&T series core routers. He further honed his expertise as the product manager for Juniper’s hierarchical-QoS Ethernet line cards, laying the groundwork for the highly successful MX-series routers. He led the design for the industry’s first OC-768c SONET interface and also played a critical role in developing \'QFabric\', the industry’s first purpose-built data center switch fabric. Viswesh started his career building VLSI CAD tools for Cirrus Logic\'s proprietary methodology, where he also later designed the industry\'s first Rambus DRAM-based memory controller for Cirrus Logic\'s first 3D graphics ASIC.Viswesh is an alumnus of IIT Varanasi, where he earned a B.Tech in Electronics. He also earned an MSEE in VLSI/CAD from Syracuse University and an MBA from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley.

Experience

1. Co-founder and VP Product

   Aurascape

   Jul 2023 — Present · Santa Clara, CA, US

   Stealth mode startup

Education

• Indian Institute of Technology (Banaras Hindu University), Varanasi

  Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.), Electronics and Telecommunications

  1985 — 1989

• Syracuse University

  MSEE, VLSI, CAD for VLSI

  1989 — 1991

• Stanford University

  Advanced Leadership Program for Executives

  2011

• University of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business

  MBA, New product development, Entrepreneurship

  2004 — 2007

Skills

• Product Lifecycle Management
• Fcoe
• Scalability
• Service Providers
• Networking
• Bgp
• Network Architecture
• Routing
• Strategy
• Project Management
• Juniper
• Distributed Systems
• Product Management
• Ethernet
• Leadership
• Routing Protocols
• Machine Learning
• Strategic Partnerships
• Pre-Sales
• Qos
• Junos
• Big Data
• Program Management
• Start-Ups
• Business Development
• Ip
• Go-to-Market Strategy
• Analytics
• Tcp/Ip
• Saas
• Carrier Ethernet
• Cloud Computing
• Management
• Network Design
• Enterprise Software
• Data Center
• Product Marketing
• Mpls
• Information Security
• Product Development