Ankur Thuse

Director of Engineering

San Francisco, California, United States15 yrs 7 mos experience

Most Likely To SwitchHighly Stable

Key Highlights

Proven track record in driving revenue growth.
Expert in leading high-performing technical teams.
Passionate about enhancing customer experiences.

Stackforce AI infers this person is a SaaS Customer Engineering Leader with expertise in product-led growth and technical adoption.

Contact

Skills

Core Skills

Customer EngineeringProduct-led GrowthCustomer EngagementRevenue ExpansionData ArchitectureSales StrategiesRelease Management

Other Skills

Technical AdoptionChurn MitigationLead Scoring ModelCross-Functional InitiativesData AnalysisSales MethodologyAutomationC++JavaWindowsHTMLCVisual BasicMac OS XUbuntu

About

Experienced leader with a proven track record of success in driving revenue and developing high-performing teams. Passionate about technology and committed to providing customers with the best possible experience. Strong leadership, communication, and problem-solving skills. 3 Guiding Principles of Leadership that I follow: Servant Leadership: I strive to to put the needs of my team members first. I am here to be for the people and nothing gives me more joy than making sure the folks I lead eat before I do. Transformational Leadership: Transformational leaders inspire and motivate their team members to achieve great things. They are also good at creating a positive work environment where team members feel valued and respected. Authentic Leadership: Authentic leaders are genuine and transparent with their team members. They are also good at building trust and rapport. Leading with Empathy is key.

Experience

15 yrs 7 mos

Total Experience

5 yrs 2 mos

Average Tenure

6 yrs 11 mos

Current Experience

Elastic

6 roles

Director, Global Customer Engineering - Self Service Cloud

May 2026 – Present · 0 mo

Leading a team of Customer Architects within Elastic's Self-Service Cloud organization, focused on driving technical adoption and product-led growth. Embedded in the engineering org, this team sits at the intersection of product, customer success, and growth — helping users experience value faster and at scale.

Customer EngineeringProduct-Led GrowthTechnical Adoption

Director, Global Customer Engineering

Nov 2025 – May 2026 · 6 mos

Lead two Customer Architecture teams spanning Self-Service Cloud and Mid-Market & General Business, with a total org of 14 (1 team lead + 13 ICs).

Director, Global Customer Engineering

Promoted

Mar 2024 – Nov 2025 · 1 yr 8 mos

Own global strategy, execution, and growth for Self-Service Cloud (SSC), overseeing customer engagement, revenue expansion, retention, and product adoption across AMER, EMEA, and APJ regions.
Owned and drove multi-channel customer engagement initiatives, advancing Self-Service Cloud growth globally with a focus on improving cloud trial conversion rates and driving monthly consumption.
Delivered double-digit net ARR expansion , contributing to an 8–10% year-over-year ARR growth through targeted engagement, expansion, and churn mitigation strategies.
Built and operationalized a self-service lead scoring model, enabling targeted Customer Engineer (CE) engagement that achieved a 5x higher trial-to-paid conversion rate (21.9% vs. 4.7%) compared to non-engaged customers, directly contributing to Self-Service Cloud ARR growth.
Championed cross-functional product, website, and marketing initiatives that directly improved customer conversion rates and increased cloud consumption, aligning tactical execution with strategic revenue goals. Leveraged a data-driven approach, incorporating churn and expansion ML models, product telemetry, and customer engagement signals to accelerate Product-Led Growth (PLG) initiatives and optimize Self-Service Cloud performance.
Led a globally distributed CE team of 20+, including promoting 2 frontline managers from within, driving leadership development and strengthening regional execution. Fostered a culture of proactive collaboration and psychological safety, empowering the team to take ownership, innovate, and drive measurable business impact.
Built and implemented a clear career development framework for CEs, providing defined tactical actions for promotion and reinforcing a culture of growth, advancement, and internal leadership development.

Customer EngagementRevenue ExpansionChurn MitigationLead Scoring ModelCross-Functional Initiatives

Senior Manager, Solutions Architecture

May 2022 – Mar 2024 · 1 yr 10 mos

Lead the US West Enterprise SA team.

Sr.Lead Solutions Architect

Oct 2021 – Apr 2022 · 6 mos

Senior Solutions Architect

May 2019 – Oct 2021 · 2 yrs 5 mos

• Presidents Club 2021

Datastax

2 roles

Sr. Solutions Engineer

Promoted

Feb 2018 – May 2019 · 1 yr 3 mos · Santa Clara, California

Presidents Club 2018 (FY19)
Field SE currently responsible for working directly with large enterprises such as eBay, Cisco, PayPal, McAfee, NetApp, Samsung, Albertsons.
Design and Implement data architectures with variety of distributed platforms and systems, with deep understanding of databases, data at rest and in motion.
Apply various sales methodology, discovery, negotiation, sales narratives, and strategic selling approaches. (MEDDIC, Value Based Selling, Challenger, etc)

Data ArchitectureSales Methodology

Solutions Engineer

Feb 2015 – Feb 2018 · 3 yrs · Santa Clara, California

DataStax Enterprise, built on Apache Cassandra™, delivers what Internet Enterprises need to compete in today’s radically connected, always-on digital world. With in-memory computing, fast and powerful integrated analytics, search, visual management, and expert support, DataStax Enterprise is the leading distributed database technology for online applications that require fast performance with no downtime.
Craft effective strategies with the Account Executive to direct sales activities across large enterprise organizations
Qualify requirements and needs, and effectively articulate DataStax's ability to meet these needs
Drive high levels of engagement through discovery sessions, enablement and solution positioning
Become a trusted advisor for customer technical and management teams
Learn new technologies and stay abreast of the distributed computing landscape
Enable customers through well crafted presentations and training sessions
Customize and adapt presentations for both small and large audiences, and for audiences with differing levels of technical experience
Drive product enhancements with Engineering during customer feedback

Sales StrategiesCustomer Engagement

Hewlett-packard

3 roles

Dev Ops Engineer

Dec 2013 – Feb 2015 · 1 yr 2 mos

Release Management & Deployment via Automation Tool (Jenkins, HP’s Operations Orchestration).
Develop Python and Shell scripts to automate and monitor processes.
Administered Servers utilized for HP SaaS Applications and Pronq.com Web Portal.
Collaborated with Pronq (SaaS Application) Team, HP SaaS R&D, and Design teams towards resolving issues.
Provided support for conducting sanity & system testing for Pronq.com Web Portal.
Subject Matter Expert in integrating PingFederate SSO Federation with external customers.
Collaborated and developed customized SQL queries utilized in internal and external reporting requests.

Release ManagementAutomation

Technical Team Lead

Jan 2013 – Dec 2013 · 11 mos

Point of contact for escalations
Lead a team of 10 Support Engineers
Helped validate quality assurance in business services provided by SOC Engineers to business consumers
Resource Capacity Planning for internal team

SW Eng Support Specialist

Sep 2010 – Mar 2013 · 2 yrs 6 mos

HP SaaS application administration and configuration - Investigation, problem identification, and resolution management.
HP SaaS application tier one technical support: Application Lifecycle Management, Business Service management (BSM),
Project and Portfolio Management (PPM), IT Service Manager (SM), Cloud: BAC Anywhere.
Building, Testing, and Maintenance of a SaaS Lab via the use of VMware Tools.
Emphasis on Process Automation through using Programming languages (Java, Visual Basic) and Scripting (Python, Shell)