Cindy Blake, CISSP

Cindy Blake is a highly experienced marketing professional with a focus on product marketing and solutions marketing. Cindy has a strong background in the technology industry, particularly in the areas of security and application development.

Starting in 1997 at Compaq, Cindy played a key role in developing marketing strategies for the health industry, including alliances, joint go-to-market efforts, and global campaigns. Cindy also contributed to the creation of Compaq's first ISV-based solutions.

After Compaq, Cindy joined HP and took on various marketing roles, including Business Development for the Energy Industry, where they successfully grew share-of-wallet in key accounts. Cindy then transitioned to the role of Director of Manufacturing Industry Solutions, where they developed account-based marketing strategies and assessed revenue and migration programs. Cindy also served as Director of the Storage Division Marketing, reducing costs and increasing storage visibility.

In 2012, Cindy joined Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) as Product Marketing Lead for Fortify, where they conducted research on the intersection of DevOps and application security. Cindy'swork informed product integrations and they created a reference architecture for rapid development and deployment with enhanced security.

Cindy then joined Triple Creek in 2017 as an Independent Marketing Consultant, advising startups and small businesses on marketing plans and conducting research for a SIEM as-a-service company.

In 2018, Cindy took on a role at SolarWinds as the Security Solutions Lead. Cindy collaborated closely with the product team and CISO to build out the security portfolio in the Managed Services Provider (MSP) division, maximizing cross-sell opportunities. Cindy also played a key role in aligning marketing efforts with the overall strategy.

Most recently, Cindy joined GitLab in 2018, initially as the Director of Product and Solutions Marketing and later transitioning to a role focused on product marketing for security. At GitLab, they played a major role in integrating security into DevOps, growing revenue from $10m to over $100m. Cindy created and shared the product story with customers, press, and analysts, and influenced the market to value integrated DevSecOps over traditional app security approaches.

In 2022, Cindy joined Firefly as the VP of Marketing, where they will continue utilizing their expertise in driving marketing strategies and promoting the company's products and services.

Cindy Blake, CISSP, has a strong education background in the field of IT. Cindy attended Texas A&M University from 1983 to 1985, where they focused on IT studies. Following that, Cindy enrolled in the University of Houston from 1985 to 1987 and earned their Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree with a specialization in IT.

In addition to their formal education, Cindy also obtained additional certifications to further enhance their skills and knowledge. In January 2013, they completed the Pragmatic Marketing certification program at Pragmatic Marketing. Later that same year, in November 2013, Cindy achieved the Certified Information System Security Professional (CISSP) credential through (ISC)2.