Black Duck Software, the leading global provider of software component management solutions, today announced that Robert M. Lapides has joined the company as executive vice president of field operations. In the newly created position, Lapides will lead the sales, professional services and business development teams responsible for driving the rapid growth of the business worldwide. He brings more than 25 years of operational experience in the software, software as a service and consulting services marketplaces.

Enterprises, software developers and embedded systems manufacturers use protexIP™, Black Duck’s flagship product, to speed software development and to ensure that their use of open source and other third-party software components is in line with accompanying licenses. Venture capital and private equity investors rely on transactIP™ to vet code to better understand intellectual property ownership, and therefore software value, in advance of making investments. Black Duck’s exportIP™ is used by organizations that develop and export software to detect cryptographic algorithms that may be subject to government regulation. Black Duck is headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts, and also has offices in San Mateo, California, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Hong Kong as well as distribution partners in Europe, Asia and Australia.

“Bob joins Black Duck as a noted business and organization builder with a background in management, sales and marketing, business development, professional services and customer service,” said Douglas Levin, chief executive of Black Duck Software. “His experience and skills complement those of our other executives and concretely round out our team at a time when we’re growing quickly. We’re adding products, people, partners and geographic reach and believe that Bob will help us take fullest advantage of the opportunities before Black Duck.”

Lapides joins Black Duck from streaming platform provider Ardence, a Citrix company, where he was executive vice president and general manager of the enterprise division. He commented: “Black Duck has enjoyed rapid growth since its founding a few years ago and is the acknowledged leader in its market. My goal is to help Black Duck move quickly to the next phase of growth by scaling operational functions in the U.S. and around the world to best support new software, services and markets.”

Before Ardence, Lapides was senior vice president of worldwide sales and customer service at EnvoyWorldWide (now part of Varolii following its acquisition by PAR3 Communications). Prior to joining EnvoyWorldWide, he was senior vice president of market development at I-Cube and subsequently Razorfish after the merger of the two companies. He has also held executive management operational roles with increasing responsibility at Liant Software Corp. and NCR Corp. Lapides holds a B.S. from Boston College.

About Black Duck Software
Black Duck Software is the leading global provider of managed software component solutions. The company helps organizations safely use open source and third-party code components while managing their software licensing obligations and mitigating business risks. Black Duck™ provides products and services that help enterprises, software developers, outsourcers, law firms and investors understand the composition and origin of software. By enabling organizations to fully manage component reuse within the software development lifecycle, Black Duck helps companies produce better quality software, reduce development and maintenance costs, and speed time-to-market. For more information, visit www.blackducksoftware.com.