Two veterans in the IT security industry are the newly named presidents of separate but two increasingly important security companies. Pat Botz, formerly IBM's lead security architect for IBM i, is the new president of Valid Technologies, and John Earl, co-founder and former director of technology and security for  The PowerTech Group, is now presdent and CEO of Patrick Townsend Security Solutions. 

Valid Technologies, parent of the VSSA Biometric Strong User Authentication suite, announced earlier this month it has named Pat Botz company president.  Botz  will lead the marketing and technical programs for the company's growing line of enterprise solutions that bring the benefits of biometrics to midsize and larger firms, the company said.

"Pat is recognized throughout the industry for his security expertise and his work on eliminating the need for passwords," said Greg Faust, managing partner of Valid Technologies, LLC.  "He brings a unique understanding of both the technical and business aspects of the problems facing our customers. He has a wealth of experience working with all levels of an organization from executive management to skilled technical resources and knows how to help them balance security, cost, and ROI.  Pat will help us make these key benefits of VSSA more apparent to the marketplace."

Botz started his career at Control Data Corp. before joining super computer manufacturer ETA Systems, Inc. At ETA he led the distributed UNIX workstation electronic computer-aided design team.  Botz later joined IBM where he worked for 19 years, most recently as the lead IBM i security architect and head of IBM Lab Services Security Consulting.

"I am thrilled about my expanded role at Valid Technologies," Botz  said. "I believe VSSA is the right product at the right time for the IT security marketplace. Companies are under enormous pressure to cut operating costs while increasing operating efficiencies and improving user accountability. VSSA is customer-proven to help a wide-range of IT shops meet these objectives.  It makes it easy and affordable to integrate two-factor authentication in emerging computing environments such as mobile and cloud-based as well as in traditional and Web-based environments. Our task now is to communicate all of the benefits of VSSA to the marketplace." 

Botz said he will have his hand deeply into security project planning, architecture, and design services and, for the immediate future, at least, his calendar is open. For additional information, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or post an inquiry at www.validtech.com. 

Patrick Townsend Security Solutions (PTSS) announced today it has hired John Earl as its president and CEO. Patrick Townsend, founder and current president, will immediately assume the role of chairman of the board, and chief technology officer.

 "I'm really pleased to have John on board," said Townsend. "He brings a wealth of IT security experience with him and the necessary leadership skills to take the company to the next level of success."

Earl has nearly 30 years experience in the IBM midrange market. He was co-founder of the PowerTech Group and was vice president and chief technology officer. Earl is a widely recognized System i (AS/400) security expert, serves as a subject matter expert for security with COMMON, and is a former board member of the user group.

"I'm excited to join a company with such a strong foundation in encryption and data privacy solutions," said Earl. "Patrick Townsend Security Solutions is already the leader in cross-platform AES encryption and PGP for the System i. Now, we see tremendous opportunity for growth as we move toward introducing the new Encryption Key Manager solution to market." 

About Patrick Townsend Security Solutions

Townsend Security provides data encryption and key management solutions to some of the world's best known companies. Calling itself "the encryption company," Townsend is privately held and has its headquarters in Olympia, Wash. For more information visit www.patownsend.com or call 800-357-1019.

About Valid Technologies and VSSA

Valid Technologies offers solutions that help customers cut costs and improve security though proven biometric technologies.  VSSA extends throughout an organization to deliver transaction-level user authentication cross-platform.   Visit http://www.validtech.com or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..