# Derek Collison

> Derek Collison is the founder and CEO of Synadia and creator of NATS, an open-source messaging system. His career spans TIBCO, Google, VMware and Apcera, with work on enterprise messaging, Google AJAX APIs and Cloud Foundry. He advocates simpler, secure connectivity across clouds, regions and edge devices.

- **Role:** Founder and CEO at Synadia; creator of NATS
- **Organizations:** Synadia, NATS, Apcera, VMware, Google, TIBCO
- **Known for:** Created NATS., Designed and architected Cloud Foundry at VMware., Co-founded Google’s AJAX APIs group.

## Career timeline

- **1990s-2003** — Worked on enterprise messaging at Teknekron/TIBCO, including Rendezvous; became SVP and chief architect.
- **2003-2009** — Worked at Google, co-founding the AJAX APIs group.
- **2009-2012** — Led cloud application platform architecture at VMware and designed Cloud Foundry.
- **2010** — Created NATS for Cloud Foundry, initially in Ruby.
- **2012** — Left VMware and founded Apcera; subsequently moved NATS to Go.
- **2017** — Founded Synadia to build a business around NATS and distributed connectivity.
- **2024** — Synadia announced a $25 million Series B led by Forgepoint Capital, bringing announced total funding to $51 million.
- **2025** — CNCF and Synadia agreed that NATS would remain within CNCF under Apache 2.0, with Synadia continuing its involvement.

## Achievements

- Created NATS.
- Designed and architected Cloud Foundry at VMware.
- Co-founded Google’s AJAX APIs group.
- Worked on TIBCO Rendezvous enterprise messaging.
- Founded Apcera and Synadia.
- Advocated Go for cloud infrastructure early in the language’s development.

## Latest updates

- **2026-10** — In a public LinkedIn post, emphasized intelligent connectivity and data movement in manufacturing while sharing a webinar scheduled for October 27, 2026.
- **2025-05** — Joined Changelog Interviews #641 to discuss NATS origins, engineering, open source and the CNCF dispute.
- **2025-05** — CNCF and Synadia announced their agreement on NATS stewardship, Apache 2.0 development and trademark assignment.

## Links

- Website: https://derekcollison.net
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/derekcollison
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/derekcollison
- GitHub: https://github.com/derekcollison
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/derekcollison/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/derek-collison
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-10-26