NetApp is strengthening its technical leadership in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. Effective May 1, 2026, Jürgen Hofkens will assume the role of Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Sales Engineering for the EMEA-LATAM region.
NetApp has appointed Jürgen Hofkens as Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Sales Engineering for the EMEA and Latin America region, effective May 1, 2026. He will report to Willem Hendrickx, SVP and General Manager EMEA-LATAM.
Hofkens will lead the technical strategy in the region and support customers with the operationalization of artificial intelligence, data sovereignty and cybersecurity, as well as flexible workload placement in hybrid cloud environments.
“I keep hearing the same three questions from CIOs and CISOs: How do I make my data usable for AI? How do I ensure sovereignty, confidentiality and security? And how do I deploy data where it creates the most value — on-premises, at the edge or in the cloud?” Hofkens said. He plans to engage with partners and customers across the region in the coming months.
Willem Hendrickx welcomed the appointment: “Our customers need to prepare data for AI, address cyber threats and ensure seamless operations across cloud and on-premises environments. Jürgen Hofkens brings extensive expertise to these challenges.”
Hofkens joins NetApp from Amazon Web Services (AWS), where he was responsible for Go-to-Market strategies for AI infrastructure across EMEA and led the transition from experimentation to production. Previously, he co-founded GIG Technology and served as EMEA CTO and Head of Sales Engineering at Alcatel-Lucent. He is based in Belgium.
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