Cloudwerx Names Brendan Connolly COO and AI Lead, Reuniting Cloud Sherpas Alumni
â–Ľ Summary
– Cloudwerx has appointed Brendan Connolly as Chief Operating Officer and head of its data and agentic AI division, bringing over 20 years of experience from companies like Accenture and BearingPoint.
– The company has introduced two proprietary frameworks: a fixed-price “Delivery Units” model for services and the Tesseract design system, both aimed at making AI and cloud service delivery faster and more predictable.
– Cloudwerx’s Delivery Units have generated over $150 million in customer value from more than 1,000 units sold, shifting the focus from selling time to delivering repeatable, high-quality outcomes.
– Allegis Group has successfully used Cloudwerx’s Success Plans and Delivery Units for over three years, reporting benefits like fixed costs, flexible scope, and no cost overruns or change requests.
– Connolly joined Cloudwerx due to its innovative approach to applying AI in services delivery, which he views as a dynamic solution to outdated consulting models that better manages risk and unlocks value for clients.
Cloudwerx has appointed Brendan Connolly as its new Chief Operating Officer and head of its data and agentic AI division, reinforcing its leadership in the Australian technology services sector. Connolly, based in Sydney, will focus on scaling and productizing the company’s Agentic AI offerings and delivery methods, particularly across data platforms, Salesforce, and other AI technologies.
With over twenty years of consulting and services experience, Connolly previously served as Managing Director and Data and AI Go to Market Lead for ANZ at Accenture. His career includes significant roles at BearingPoint, Pactera, and Cloud Sherpas. At Cloudwerx, he joins a leadership team composed largely of former Cloud Sherpas executives, including CEO Toby Wilcock, Chief Growth Officer Alyssia Tennant, Chief Strategy & Innovation Officer John Cosgrove, and CTO Chris Baldock. This reunion brings together professionals who were instrumental in shaping the regional cloud ecosystem.
Toby Wilcock expressed enthusiasm about the appointment, stating, “We are thrilled to have Brendan join us. It’s a real vote of confidence in the business we have built and the talent within the team. Brendan is a proven business builder and I have no doubt we will go from strength to strength with him onboard.”
Connolly explained that his move to Cloudwerx was motivated by the company’s innovative application of AI to service delivery, an area where many competitors have faced challenges. “Clients of every scale want delivery that is simpler and more predictable,” he noted. “If AI speeds work, services should reflect that and Cloudwerx are market leading in the approach they are taking to redefine services delivery.”
Following its acquisition of data and AI consultancy Lightfold in 2024, Cloudwerx has expanded two proprietary frameworks that support its applied agentic AI programs, including initiatives related to Salesforce Agentforce. The first framework draws inspiration from modern construction, engineering, and manufacturing, introducing a new model for pricing, packaging, and delivering services. Clients commit to a Success Plan that includes fixed-price “Delivery Units”, modular components that can be exchanged for a variety of shippable features across data, AI, and Salesforce projects as needed.
To date, Cloudwerx has sold and delivered more than 1,000 Delivery Units across various cloud technologies, generating over $150 million in client value since the system launched. John Cosgrove, former Lightfold CEO and now Chief Strategy & Innovation Officer at Cloudwerx, remarked that this approach “moves us beyond selling time to providing small, high-performance squads that operate like modern manufacturing cells, delivering repeatable outcomes where incentives align with speed and quality.”
The second framework, known as Tesseract, is a modular, productized design system that prioritizes human outcomes while adapting swiftly to agentic AI. It standardizes quality across Salesforce, cloud data, and AI implementations, enabling faster and more predictable delivery. This framework ensures that design reforms keep pace with delivery innovations, a critical factor in the current era of agentic AI.
Allegis Group, which includes prominent recruitment brands like TEKsystems, Aerotek, and Aston Carter, has collaborated with Cloudwerx through Success Plans for over three years. Their projects have included Snowflake data platforms, multi-region Salesforce delivery, and new agentic AI solutions.
James Warwick, Chief Operating Officer for Allegis APAC, commented, “It is hard to imagine going back. Delivery Units give us fixed cost with flexible scope, and we can scale up or down on demand. Tesseract standardizes design, so quality holds even as needs vary by region. What’s remarkable is how easy it makes budget planning and management, we’ve never needed a change request, we’ve had zero cost overruns and we combine sprint and backlog planning into basically the same instrument.”
Connolly added, “Consulting has been largely static for thirty years. Clients deserve better than partnering and solutioning models designed to solve the problems of yesterday. Cloudwerx’s approach is refreshingly new and dynamic and is helping clients manage risk, unlock real value from agentic AI, backed by measurable outcomes.”
Cloudwerx continues to stand out in the technology services market by combining start-up agility with enterprise-level precision. Its 200-person team, supported by the Tesseract framework, designs and delivers cloud and AI solutions that are not only effective but also user-friendly. In partnership with industry leaders like Salesforce and Snowflake, the company remains dedicated to transforming how technology is built and delivered, consistently unlocking significant value for its clients.
(Source: ITWire Australia)