NetApp appoints Jürgen Hofkens as CTO and VP Sales Engineering, EMEA and LATAM

NetApp announced the appointment of Jürgen Hofkens as Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Sales Engineering for EMEA and LATAM, effective 1 May 2026. He will report to Willem Hendrickx, SVP and General Manager, EMEA and LATAM. Hofkens will lead the region’s technical strategy and customer engagement. He joins at a time when enterprises are operationalising AI and increasingly concerned about data sovereignty and cybersecurity. And seeking options such as flexible hybrid cloud to address those concerns.

Hofkens replaces Gavin Moore, who has held the role for the last two years. It isn’t clear whether Moore is staying within NetApp or moving on to somewhere else.

Hendrickx said, “Our customers and partners are navigating a once-in-a-generation shift: making their data ready for AI, hardening it against new cyber threats, and running it seamlessly across clouds and on-premises. Jürgen’s appointment reflects our commitment to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them, backed by the deepest technical expertise in the industry.

“We are also growing our sales engineering, AI, and cybersecurity teams across the region, and welcome talented people who share that customer focus to join us.”

Who is Jürgen Hofkens

Hofkens joins NetApp from AWS, where he spent nearly six years. He joined as EMEA Head of Compute Solution Architecture and was later promoted to EMEA Head of Core Services and Advanced Compute Solution Architecture.

During his tenure, he led the full Go-to-Market for AI Infrastructure across EMEA — owning strategy, technical field execution, and customer outcomes as enterprises scaled from experimentation to production. In parallel, he led the EMEA technical teams covering AWS’s core services and advanced computing portfolio, spanning security, networking, compute, edge, HPC, IoT, and hybrid cloud.

Hofkens also co-founded GIG Technology EMEA, which built a distributed object and block storage platform. He spent nearly 18 years at Nokia, where he held several sales roles over his tenure, rising to Global Head of Solutions. Hofkens has a BA and MBA from Vlerick Business School and an MSc in Electrical Engineering from KU Leuven.

Hofkens said, “Every CIO and CISO I speak with is asking the same three questions: how do I turn my data into an AI advantage, how do I keep it sovereign, private, and secure, and how do I keep the flexibility to run it wherever the business needs it — on-premises, at the edge, or in any cloud? NetApp sits at the intersection of those questions like no other company.

“I intend to spend the coming months on the ground with our customers and partners across EMEA and LATAM — listening, challenging, and co-designing what intelligent data infrastructure looks like for their business.”

Enterprise Times: What does this mean

Customers and prospects interested in meeting Hofkens during his trip should contact their NetApp representative. It is a rare opportunity to sit down with an executive who will be looking to understand the pain point they face and be in a position to steer decisions over the coming months.

NetApp has selected someone who has a deeper understanding of the technology it provides and understands the business side as well. Based in Belgium, he has experience of working abroad and of working internationally. It will be interesting to see how he shapes the NetApp go-to-market in the coming months.

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