Employee Spotlight: Q&A with Peddareddappa G, Senior Director of Engineering and Site Leader at Nasuni’s India Innovation Center

As Nasuni’s launches its third innovation center in India, we caught up with Site Leader and Senior Director of Engineering, Peddareddappa G (GPR for short). He brings over 25 years of experience leading engineering functions at global tech companies, including NetApp and Cisco, to Nasuni’s newest innovation hub. In this exclusive interview, GPR shares his approach to attracting the right talent, how to build relationships with partner organizations, and what excites him most about this ambitious project. 

Q: It’s great to have the chance to sit down with you at such a busy time! For those who don’t know you yet, can you introduce yourself and your role?

My name is Peddareddappa G, but you can call me GPR, and I serve as Senior Director of Engineering and Site Leader at Nasuni’s India Innovation Center (IIC) in Hyderabad. In this dual capacity, I am responsible for both engineering leadership and site operations, ensuring seamless alignment between strategic goals, technology delivery, and organizational growth.

On the engineering front, I lead the product roadmap, release management, and quality assurance, ensuring our teams build secure, scalable, and high-impact solutions that drive customer value. I work with global counterparts to deliver innovations that strengthen Nasuni’s position as a leader in cloud-native file data services.

As a site leader, I oversee the operational backbone of the center, including IT infrastructure, local policies, compliance, and government engagement. I collaborate with HR and leadership teams to shape organizational structure, recruit top talent, and foster a culture of collaboration, learning, and excellence.

Q: What is Nasuni’s India Innovation Center and what will happen there?

The IIC will serve as a strategic extension of our Boston headquarters and Cork Innovation Center, uniting engineering, support, and non-engineering roles in a true follow-the-sun model. The center will own and lead key solutions end-to-end, beginning with the Nasuni Portal and our ransomware protection solution, while also playing a critical role in driving AI enablement across the organization.

The site will be a hub for innovation, spearheading new initiatives in generative AI and agentic AI, and helping shape the future of Nasuni’s products and solutions on a global scale.

Q: What was it that drew you to the role and to Nasuni?

I’ve held Director of Software Engineering roles at both Cisco and NetApp, but I wanted a role that went beyond product delivery, combining end-to-end engineering ownership with contributing to the growth of the organization in India. At Nasuni, I saw an opportunity to drive innovation in a startup-style culture, while shaping both the products we deliver and the IIC’s growth and impact.

Another attraction for me was the technology itself. Nasuni is disrupting the NAS market, reimagining it in ways that break from traditional approaches. Being part of a company that’s driving change in this space was something I didn’t want to miss.

What really confirmed my decision were my interactions with Sam and the senior leadership team. They were open to my ideas on how we could grow the site, attract top talent, and build the brand. I shared a few thoughts, and they acknowledged some as initiatives worth implementing in the site’s growth journey. It was immediately clear that I would have the freedom to execute on my vision.

Q: Can you talk me through how you’re managing the launch of the IIC?

We’ve incorporated Nasuni India Pvt. Ltd. and are actively hiring! Our teams have already started working in a 30-40 person incubation space. In parallel, we are finalizing our long-term facility, which will accommodate 150-200 people and serve as the IIC’s primary hub.

This August, Sam King, Alison Bayiates, Matt McDonald, and Barrie Kuza visited Hyderabad to review workspace options and ensure we could provide the best environment for our growing team. Once the new facility is ready, the senior leadership team will return to inaugurate the site — a milestone we will celebrate together with our Hyderabad employees.

Q: What makes India the ideal location for a new innovation center?

India (specifically Hyderabad) offers an exceptional ecosystem for an innovation center. The city has a strong presence of global technology companies, a robust infrastructure ecosystem, and access to a deep pool of top talent. This unique combination makes it the ideal location for us to build, scale, and drive next-generation solutions.

Q: You mentioned you’re currently recruiting for the IIC. What are you looking for when hiring?

When hiring for the IIC, we look for individuals with strong technical expertise in SaaS, NAS storage, Linux systems, scalable front-end/back-end manageability solutions, CI/CD, and related areas. We place equal importance on the right attitude and the ability to collaborate effectively with global teams.

We value people who thrive in a startup-style culture, take ownership and accountability, and are eager to drive innovation while growing alongside the company. When hiring, we include both a personality test and an aptitude test to help us understand candidates holistically — not just their technical skills, but also how they will contribute to our culture and vision.

Q: What advice would you give to somebody who is thinking of applying?

I think it’s important to address questions around learning and technology, career growth, compensation, and job stability so that applicants can make an informed choice.

On technology and learning, unstructured data is exploding and will accelerate further with the rise of agentic AI. Nasuni builds the infrastructure to manage unstructured file data, providing seamless and high-performance access across on-premises, public, and private cloud environments. We deliver solutions for backup and restore, disaster recovery, and anti-ransomware protection, enabling customers to leverage AI to turn data into wisdom. We also empower AI agents and workloads to access data quickly and securely.

This creates tremendous opportunities to learn and contribute (we are building software used by Fortune 500 companies!), shape Nasuni’s global product roadmap, and develop next-gen cloud products that enable AI, analytics, and SaaS-driven orchestration.

On career development, joining the IIC at launch offers a true first-mover advantage. As part of the founding India cohort, employees will have early influence, direct access to leadership, and the chance for rapid career growth. In terms of compensation, Nasuni is competitive with other leading product companies in the city and offers an attractive package of benefits, including Long-Term Incentive Plans (LTIPs), medical coverage, and more.

And on stability, Nasuni is in a very strong position. The company has been around for 13 years, is profitable, and has already moved beyond the risky startup “crossing the chasm” phase. Today, we are a profitable SaaS business, scaling at 25% CAGR YoY, with $160M ARR, a $1.2B valuation, and more than 900 customers worldwide!

Q: What can you tell us about the kind of projects or initiatives that the IIC’s founding employees will be contributing to?

We plan to launch three to four products and solutions delivered end-to-end from India, beginning with the Nasuni Portal, anti-ransomware protection, Ops IQ, and other AI-driven initiatives. In addition, the IIC will make significant contributions across other areas such as platform, data path, cloud services, system testing, CI/CD, sustenance, and customer support.

We are also in the process of identifying key non-engineering roles to establish and scale operations, ensuring the site becomes a comprehensive hub for product development and organizational growth

Q: What excites you the most about the IIC?

What excites me most goes well beyond engineering; it’s about creating the complete operational ecosystem that makes a site successful, while also driving innovation and initiatives that showcase the canter’s core strengths.

Building such an ecosystem requires multiple functions and verticals working seamlessly together. I see this as both a significant responsibility and a tremendous learning opportunity. Ensuring the security and morale of employees, forging the right partnerships with internal functions, collaborating with academia to attract top talent, and strengthening our brand visibility in the market will all be critical to our success.

With its thriving Global Capability Center ecosystem, Hyderabad offers the perfect foundation for us to leverage best practices, forge strategic partnerships, and build a strong culture of innovation. This will both advance Nasuni’s global vision and position the IIC as a benchmark for excellence.

Q: Thinking about the future of the IIC, what would success look like to you in a year from now?

For me, there are three primary measures of success as first-year focus areas.

First is talent. My goal is to build a collaborative, high-performing organization that accelerates Nasuni’s roadmap. Teams across all geographies must operate as one unit — working seamlessly across time zones, embracing diversity, and fostering a culture of collaboration and accountability.

Second is partnerships with the ecosystem. Establishing strong relationships with universities, colleges, and other innovation hubs will be critical. Within a year, I would like the top ten universities in Hyderabad and across India to know Nasuni and understand the value we bring.

Third is innovation. True success will be when, a year from now, a senior leader can say, “This significant contribution or initiative came from IIC Hyderabad.” While I cannot predict today what those contributions will be, I am excited about the potential to nurture innovation with a tangible global impact.