Vahé Torossian is the corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Worldwide Small and Midmarket Solutions and Partners (SMS&P) organization. With 30 years of international high-tech experience across both developed and emerging markets, his 23 years at Microsoft demonstrate a record of driving successful business transformation and turnarounds in both high-growth and crisis economic environments. Since 2010, Torossian has led the multi-billion-dollar SMS&P organization to double its revenue in the commercial and public sector space.
Torossian and his team have transformed the segment and partner ecosystem to Microsoft’s mobile-first, cloud-first worldview and are playing a key role in driving the company’s business cloud services growth (including products such as Office 365, Dynamics CRM Online, Microsoft Azure, Enterprise Mobility Suite and Microsoft Intune).
Under his collaborative leadership, SMS&P has become the fastest-growing commercial business segment for Microsoft. Working across Microsoft’s business groups, SMS&P drives sales and marketing efforts and provides comprehensive IT solutions for small to medium-sized businesses and corporate accounts (including public sector customers). SMS&P leads Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Group, which owns driving the company’s channel partner strategy, including the Microsoft Partner Network and Surface Commercial Channel Sales (Surface devices sales). In addition, SMS&P oversees the Microsoft Hosting Service Providers organization (managed services cloud partners), worldwide software asset management and compliance (intellectual property rights) and global inside sales (telesales) organization.
Previously, he was the area vice president of Microsoft’s Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region and vice president Microsoft International, where he oversaw 26 subsidiaries serving 32 countries, leading one of Microsoft’s fastest-growing regions and helping to steer the company’s activities in EMEA as a member of the regional leadership team. He left an impressive track record in the CEE region, managing it through hyper growth, the 2009 economic downturn and the recent market recovery. Under his tenure, Microsoft significantly grew its business performance and improved the satisfaction of customers and partners. He developed and enriched relationships with governments, opened additional subsidiaries across CEE and nearly tripled the number of employees in the region.
Prior to his leadership role in CEE, Torossian served as general manager of Microsoft’s SMS&P organization in the Asia region for three years. During his tenure in Singapore, the region experienced unprecedented growth and development, and Torossian gained a wealth of experience working with emerging markets including India, China and Southeast Asia. He also successfully led the integration of different product lines and businesses within Microsoft.
Torossian joined Microsoft in 1992 to create the channel marketing organization for Microsoft France. Subsequently, he led numerous business divisions and initiatives in France from consumer, retail, OEM and SMB, and he was named deputy general manager of the French subsidiary.
Prior to joining Microsoft, he held both business and consumer sales and marketing management positions with Texas Instruments Inc. Torossian is a graduate of ISG in Paris and INSEAD and holds an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Torossian is a strong diversity and inclusion advocate who served for four years as co-chair of the Microsoft Sales, Marketing and Service Group’s Women’s Leadership Board and, starting in 2015, co-chairs the companywide Executive Leadership Board for Women@Microsoft initiative. He is also on the Board of Directors for the Pacific Northwest French American Chamber of Commerce. Feel free to connect with Vahé Torossian on LinkedIn.
