Eric Kelly rings the opening bell (photo courtesy of his wife Valarie Kelly, political science ’82).
By Pat Lopes Harris, Media Relations Director
When Overland Storage Inc. visited the NASDAQ MarketSite in New York City’s Times Square Oct. 14, the company’s CEO, an SJSU alumnus, rang the opening bell. Eric Kelly has served as the data protection and management solutions provider’s CEO since January 2009 and as a board member since 2007. Previously, Kelly was president of Silicon Valley Management Partners Inc., a management consulting and M&A advisory firm, which he co-founded in 2007. Mr. Kelly spent nearly 30 years in computer technology developing distinct operational, marketing and sales expertise. His most recent corporate position was vice president and general manager of storage systems solutions at Adaptec, Inc. Prior to that, he served as president and CEO of Snap Appliance, which was acquired by Adaptec. Two years earlier, Kelly engineered the purchase of Snap from Quantum Corp., having recognized the inherent value in Snap, where the main product he drove became the volume market leader in Network Attached Storage (NAS) appliances. His previous corporate affiliations include Maxtor Corp., Dell Computer Corp., Diamond Multimedia, Conner Peripherals and IBM. Mr. Kelly earned an M.B.A. from San Francisco State University and a B.S. in Business from San Jose State University.