KG

Kelly Goetsch

Chief Strategy Officer at commercetools / MACH Alliance Co-founder / 4x O'Reilly Author

United States

Invests in

Stages:

  • Min Investment:

    $5,000.00
  • Max Investment:

    $50,000.00
  • Target Investment:

    $25,000.00

Work Experience

  • Chief Strategy Officer

    2022

    - Leading company-wide AI strategy - Company, portfolio and product strategy - what adjacent areas do we care about? Why? Do we build, buy or partner? - M&A - Strategic partnerships - Google Cloud, Microsoft, AWS, key SIs and ISVs, VIP customers, etc - Thought leadership - writing and speaking on behalf of the company

  • Chief Product Officer

    2016 - 2022

    Globally responsible for product strategy, product management, design, and integrations. Deeply involved with M&A, strategic partnerships, fundraising and other corporate development-related topics. - Increased ARR from $2m -> $100m+ and employee headcount from 90 -> 500+ - Put commercetools on Gartner's Magic Quadrant Gartner and Forrester's Wave reports for the first time. Named "Leader" in Gartner, Forrester and IDC by 2020 and top scores for product strategy - Generally building and dominating the "headless commerce" category - Built product management function

  • Board Member

    2023

    Helped them secure their first external fundraise: https://www.bluestonepim.com/press-releases/bluestone-pim-secures-strategic-investment-for-next-growth-phase

  • Co-Founder

    2020

    commercetools and 112+ other leading vendors have come together to declare the end to the all-in-one suite. We have a better way that is best defined by the "MACH" acronym, where M=Microservices, A=APIs, C=Cloud, and H=Headless. commercetools invented headless commerce and the acronym "MACH" Members include AWS, GCP, Stripe, Adyen, PayPal, MongoDB, Deloitte, Sapient, and more. See current membership at https://machalliance.org/members. We have an annual operating budget of > $4m, with full time staff of nine as of July 2023. We serve three primary functions: - 1) Educate the world on what MACH is and why it's better. We write content, host conferences, host webinars, etc to educate everyone from developers to CFOs on the value of MACH - 2) Certify vendors as adhering to MACH principles. We gave this certification to 29% of all applicants in our first year. A MACH certification is the industry-wide standard for adherence to MACH, to the point where large multinationals have adopted MACH Certified-only vendor selection policies - 3) Serve as a community. Our ambassador program (25 senior practitioners working for brands), executive advisory board (46 C-level luminaries from brands and vendors - see https://machalliance.org/insights/staying-focused-why-we-re-expanding-the-mach-alliance-advisory-board), the various councils within the MACH Alliance, and events bring together MACH proponents

  • Chairman

    2021 - 2023

    - Strategic direction of the MACH Alliance - Managed up to the executive advisory board (https://machalliance.org/insights/staying-focused-why-we-re-expanding-the-mach-alliance-advisory-board) - Transitioned organization from founder-led to member-led (expanded board, open elections across membership, etc) - Served as liaison to and onboarded AWS, GCP, Deloitte, Sapient, Netlify, etc and other flagship members

  • Founding President

    2020 - 2021

    - Registered corporation, defined bylaws, secured 501(c)(6) tax exempt status - Served as founding president of the five-member board - Grew vendor membership from four at founding (March 2020), to 11 at launch (June 2020), to 33 by the end of the first year (June 2021). 114 companies applied to join in the first year but didn't meet admittance criteria - Managed up to the executive advisory board, presided over operating board, oversaw the various councils (tech, growth, community, marketing) - Established the ambassador program, including securing participants from companies like Ulta Beauty, Mars, Sephora, Puma, Bed Bath & Beyond and Boston Consulting Group - Helped to secure 83 MACH-related articles in the press

  • Co-host

    2018

    Commerce + technology thought leadership podcast, co-hosted with Dirk Hörig (co-founder/CEO of commercetools). Episodes at https://soundcloud.com/commercetomorrow

  • Angel Investor

    2022

  • Board Member - Associate Member Council

    2021 - 2022

    https://nrf.com/about-us/committees-councils/associate-member-council-amc

2013 - 2020

  • Book Author

    2013 - 2020

    Author of "GraphQL for Modern Commerce." Published January, 2020 (https://drive.google.com/open?id=16twJ2JEDOQgCp-XbJSeWsutMJNkhm9r2) Author of "APIs for Modern Commerce." Published October, 2017 (https://drive.google.com/open?id=1yW4_y4ElhxGAbpicTUfZ9gHlRpOUXtmq) Author of "Microservices for Modern Commerce." Published October, 2016 (https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BxMTPkq89VeHdVgyXzJrMkUwUGs) Author of “eCommerce in the Cloud.” Published May, 2014 (https://www.amazon.com/eCommerce-Cloud-Bringing-Elasticity/dp/1491946636) Regularly lead webcasts, write articles, etc

2011 - 2016

  • Director, Product Management - Microservices

    2011 - 2016

    Responsibilities included identifying new market opportunities for Oracle, defining product roadmaps, determining how/where to position products, product pricing/licensing, go-to-market, and executive-level sponsorship with customers. Worked closely with multiple stakeholders across Oracle, including operations, finance, marketing, advertising, services, support, legal, sales, and executive management. Regularly spoke on behalf of Oracle at trade shows, roundtables, webcasts, etc. Oracle role history: - 02/2016 - End: Led product management for microservices-focused Java EE revitalization work (http://www.infoworld.com/article/3098007/java/oracle-to-reboot-java-ee-for-the-cloud.html) - 09/2015 - End: Led product management for microservices initiatives at Oracle. Defined the business opportunity for Oracle, earned executive buy-in (including the president of Oracle), worked with engineering to shape the product and build a roadmap, aligned with dozens of other cloud product teams, oversaw development of the product, and will take to market when the product is ready - 02/2015 - 08/2015: Oracle Java Cloud Service and Oracle Java SE Cloud Service - focused on go-to-market - 10/2013 - 08/2015: Responsible for the business-side of Oracle Exalogic/Oracle Cloud Machine, including go-to-market. See http://blogs.wsj.com/cio/2016/03/24/oracles-new-service-turns-cloud-computing-inside-out/ - 07/2011 - 09/2013: Responsible for the intersection of ATG + larger Oracle product ecosystem DevOps track lead for JavaOne 2016

2008 - 2011

  • Chief ATG Consultant to Walmart

    2008 - 2011

    Advised Walmart on implementation methodology, long-term scalability, application architecture, deployment architecture, code quality, and content management. Led or participated in 10 ATG implementations at Walmart over five and a half years (full-time from 05/2008-07/2011). Walmart was ATG’s largest customer Implementations included Walmart.com, Walmart China (Trust-Mart), Walmart Japan (Seiyu), Walmart U.K. (ASDA), Walmart Chile (Distribución y Servicio), Walmart Canada, Sam's Club U.S., Sam’s Club China, Walmart U.S. Grocery (grocery.walmart.com), and Movie Downloads (moviedownloads.walmart.com) Global role, which involved deep collaboration with Walmart subsidiaries around the world

2005 - 2011

  • Senior Solutions Architect

    2005 - 2011

    Helped ATG's largest customers architect, develop and launch their eCommerce platforms. Participated in or led 31 ATG implementations, often as the lead architect Customers included Ann Taylor, DSW Shoe Warehouse, HP, Blockbuster, Hyatt, Volvo, DirecTV, AutoZone, PepsiCo, LL Bean, Backcountry.com, and more Author of http://www.atglaunchchecklist.com, which is a 300+ point cross-disclipinary checklist used to launch most of the ATG-powered applications around the world