Principal Product Manager- Virtualization

NetApp, Inc.•San Jose, CA

3d•$227,800 - $338,800•Onsite

About The Position

NetApp is reimagining how customers run, protect, and scale virtualized and cloud-native workloads. As enterprises modernize their data centers and navigate a rapidly shifting hypervisor landscape, NetApp is uniquely positioned to deliver differentiated storage and data management solutions across every leading virtualization platform and public cloud. We are looking for a Principal Product Manager – Virtualization to define and drive the strategy, roadmap, and execution for our virtualization portfolio across on-premises, hybrid, and cloud environments. In this role, you will sit at the intersection of deep virtualization technology expertise and strategic product leadership. You will engage with customers, partners, engineering leaders, and field experts to understand their needs, translate complex hypervisor and cloud capabilities into differentiated, market-leading products, and own the roadmap that delivers scalable, secure, and high-performance virtualization solutions. You will partner closely with strategic alliance and ISV partners — including the industry-leading hypervisor and hyperscaler vendors — to expand NetApp's routes to market and accelerate customer outcomes.

Requirements

Proven experience defining product line roadmap and strategy, with strong inbound and outbound product management skills.
Proven leadership working cross-functionally with engineering, sales, legal, finance, support, and marketing, driving results by influencing people across levels and groups.
Exceptional ability to communicate concisely and persuasively, influencing others both internally and externally.
Strong documentation skills, with the ability to produce clear, high-quality PRDs, MRDs, product specifications, and customer-facing collateral.
Strong technical and business fluency — translating data and market insights into business cases and success metrics, and decomposing complex technical propositions into business opportunities.
A growth mindset with a high bias for action and a track record of driving successful product roadmaps, with relentless focus on performance metrics and customer outcomes.
High level of integrity, excellent business judgment, and strong leadership abilities.
15+ years of relevant experience, including 10+ years of product management, product marketing, business consulting, or business operations experience.
5+ years working with virtualization, with experience across multiple hypervisor vendors, hybrid cloud, and service provider environments.
10+ years in the storage and/or data management industry, on the vendor side, is strongly preferred.
In-depth understanding of virtualization market dynamics, key trends, total addressable market (TAM), and the competitive landscape, translating market insights into product strategy.
Significant hands-on virtualization experience across multiple industry-leading hypervisors, with a strong grasp of VM lifecycle management, live migration, and resource scheduling.
Knowledge of key virtualization vendors (Broadcom/VMware, Microsoft, Red Hat, SUSE, Nutanix) is critical, alongside hands-on experience with one or more hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud) to deliver cloud-first solutions.
Strong technical foundation in storage and data management principles — replication, migration, protection, and governance; familiarity with NetApp's products and competitive landscape is a plus.
Experience with containers and modern infrastructure, including Kubernetes; public cloud or service provider experience is an advantage.
Experience with enterprise database and application platforms such as Microsoft SQL, SAP HANA, and Oracle Database is a plus.
Comfortable bridging product management, program management, partnership management, services delivery, support, and sales and channel.

Nice To Haves

Familiarity with NetApp's products and competitive landscape is a plus.
Public cloud or service provider experience is an advantage.
Experience with enterprise database and application platforms such as Microsoft SQL, SAP HANA, and Oracle Database is a plus.

Responsibilities

Independently lead the end-to-end strategy, roadmap, business goals, and growth targets for one or more virtualization products or the broader virtualization platform portfolio across on-premises, hybrid, and cloud deployments.
Own both inbound and outbound product management — synthesizing market and competitive analysis, customer requirements, and use cases into PRFAQs, defining the roadmap and prioritization, and guiding offerings through the product lifecycle.
Define and drive the virtualization value proposition — performance benchmarks, TCO advantages, and feature differentiation — to support go-to-market strategies and sales enablement.
Build tight alignment with leading hypervisor and hyperscaler partners (both technical and business functions), services, customers, sales, and channel partners essential to your programs.
Lead cross-functional execution across Product, Engineering, Sales, Legal, Finance, Support, and Marketing — acting as the integrator who connects Field, Partner, and Alliance/ISV teams to deliver quality releases on schedule.
Serve as the virtualization subject matter authority and external evangelist — directing internal teams, enabling sales and partner communities, and representing the product to customers, executives, and industry forums.
Partner with sales, marketing, and ecosystem partners on go-to-market plays that drive customer adoption, expansion, and retention, reporting business KPIs through a regular cadence of reviews.
Shift comfortably between strategy and tactical execution, staying focused on current and future customer needs and using data and metrics to maximize decision quality.