Sources: Crowdstrike Hires Former Tanium Exec As Head Of Worldwide Sales

As the battle for the endpoint security market heats up, Crowdstrike has landed former Tanium top sales executive Mike Carpenter as its new head of worldwide sales, sources told CRN.

Carpenter left Tanium in September, where he had been president of global sales and field operations since February 2014. Sources said Carpenter is now being brought in to lead worldwide sales and that an announcement about the move could come as soon as next Monday.

Carpenter did not respond to requests for comment from CRN. His LinkedIn profile currently says "president – to be announced soon."

[Related: Carbon Black, IBM Take Aim At Competitor Tanium With New Partnership]

Crowdstrike declined to comment when reached by CRN.

Carpenter has a long history in the security market, prior to Tanium serving as president of the Americas for Intel Security. During his 12-year stint at the company, then McAfee, he worked with Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz, who was worldwide chief technology officer and executive vice president before leaving and starting Crowdstrike in 2012. Kurtz did not respond to direct requests for comment about the executive addition.

The move is the latest example of rapidly accelerating competition in the endpoint security market, where both Tanium and Crowdstrike play. Tanium's peer-to-peer technology lets organizations continuously scan all endpoints in a network to detect vulnerabilities and unmanaged devices, technology which is critical as companies look to ramp up the security and management of endpoint devices. Crowdstrike focuses in the endpoint detection and response market and is one of the leading players in that space.

It is also the latest piece of news coming out of Tanium, which has been red-hot in the security space but has had multiple reports of buyout offers, including rejected bids from Palo Alto Networks and VMware, and seen multiple top-level executive departures, including Carpenter and multiple other top executives in recent months.

Crowdstrike, for its part, was recently ranked as one of the fastest-growing companies in the country by Deloitte. It has been expanding its executive team over the past few months, adding Jerry Dixon as chief information security officer and Rod Murchison as vice president of product management in October. It also added Brian Brouillette as vice president of customer success in August.