Splunk's CEO Departs as Company Reveals Positive Cloud Growth

After six years on the job, Doug Merritt has stepped down as Splunk's President and CEO. Graham Smith, the Chair of the San Francisco-based tech company's Board of Directors, has assumed the role on an interim basis.

Splunk, which produces software for searching, monitoring, and analyzing machine-generated data, has also named Steve Newberry as Lead Independent Director of the Board while Smith acts as CEO.

Merritt will remain with Splunk in an advisory role as the company searches for Merritt's permanent replacement. "We determined now is the right time to transition to our next phase of leadership," Merritt revealed in the company's announcement, "in particular, the Board is focused on identifying a leader with a proven track record of scaling operations and growing multi-billion dollar enterprises."

Before Merritt became CEO in 2015, he spent a year as Splunk's SVP of Field Operations. Before that, he was the SVP of Products and Solutions Marketing at Cisco and the CEO of marketing technology firm Baynote.

"Since his appointment as CEO in 2015, Doug has led Splunk through critical product and business model transformations, which have enabled the company to become the leading data platform across Security, Observability and IT," Smith added. "With the proven success of our ongoing cloud transformation and our team's strong execution, we are confident that Splunk is well positioned for its next phase of growth."

Merritt's eventual replacement will take over on the back of ten consecutive quarters of double-digit growth in its cloud business, which shows no signs of slowing down and just passed the billion-dollar mark.

Splunk generated approximately $1.1 billion in annual recurring revenue (ARR) from its cloud business in the past quarter, up 75% year-over-year.

This surge in cloud revenue follows the increased focus the company has put into the segment. Earlier this year, it named its first Chief Cloud Officer and hired Amazon cloud veteran Garth Fort as its Chief Product Officer.