Coworking with Param Kumarasamy

Coworking is a weekly segment where we spotlight Emerging Tech Brew readers who work with emerging technologies. Click here if you’d like a chance to be featured.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in tech?

Product management brings together technology, customer needs, and market direction to solve business problems. As a good product manager, I must have visibility into these three areas. That visibility helps to drive the product strategy and roadmap.

What emerging tech are you most optimistic about? Least? And why?

One of the areas I’m most excited about is AI and machine learning (ML) and how it can be applied toward our enterprise data management solutions. For example, by looking at the way hundreds of different customers are using our solutions, we can take those learnings and identify best practices for data management. For example, AI/ML can be useful for anomaly detection, such as quickly detecting and identifying any big changes that are happening with the data, which might indicate a ransomware attack.

I wouldn’t say that I have any areas that I’m least optimistic about. Data growth at exponential rates is causing data-sprawl issues across on-premises and cloud, and that creates opportunities for us to help our customers.

One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile?

A big part of my role is figuring out: How do we adapt our product releases based on customer trends? How do we make sure our portfolio aligns with customers going through their cloud transformation? How do we define our roadmap so that it aligns with where the industry is heading? Those aspects of the job don’t necessarily leap off the page of my LinkedIn profile.

What do you think about when you’re not thinking about tech?

When you work in tech, it’s important to take a break from the screens when you can! Spend time with the family, participate in sports or other outdoor activities. I’m a long-distance runner, so I aim to chalk up a couple of marathons each year.