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Our Team

Our service-obsessed team is focused on your success!
Our amazing team is global and growing. We have staff located all around the world, covering many markets, languages, and service needs.  With over 25 years of experience, our team of experts will help drive your business forward, now and in the decades to come.  

Leadership Team

Dereck Garnier
Derek Garnier is a 35-year industry veteran in digital infrastructure, specializing in corporate strategy, and has successfully built, operated, and sold companies.

He was most recently co-founder of Arcadian Infracom, a long-haul fiber optic company operating in the Southwest. Prior to Arcadian, Derek served as President and COO of Evocative Datacenters which he again joins as President and COO.

Derek also served as the CEO of Layer42 Networks, a national network services and colocation provider, which he successfully exited in 2015 through a sale to Wave Broadband. Post-acquisition, Derek continued as Wave’s SVP of Datacenter services. Before his tenure at Layer42 Networks, Derek held management positions at QTS Datacenters and AboveNet Communications through the acquisition of Sitesmith, a global managed services provider of which he was an early employee. 

Derek began his career as an engineer, serving in the rolefor network and data center provider ISI, later renamed Global Crossing via multiple acquisitions, as well as at network companies MFS Datanet and Cabletron Systems.
Chief Executive Officer
Robert Doherty
Robert Doherty has nearly 35 years of financial experience in the communications, technology and media industries. He has broad experience helping growth-stage, private companies to build and execute successful long-term business plans.

Prior to joining Evocative, Robert served as the Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Effectual, a managed service provider of cloud migration services for enterprise and government customers. Prior to Effectual, Robert ran Finance for vXchnge – a nationwide provider of datacenter services. Before that, Robert was the CFO of FiberMedia – an East Coast regional provider of datacenter services.

Before his various operating roles, Robert spent almost 20 years as a telecom and technology investment banker at firms such as PaineWebber, Salomon Brothers, Citigroup and Redwood Capital. In that capacity, Robert helped his clients raise billions of dollars of equity and debt in the public and private markets. He was also involved in negotiating a large number of buy-side and sell-side M&A transactions for his clients.

Robert holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania, and an M.B.A. in Finance from the Stern School of Business at New York University.

Chief Financial Officer
Chris Conley
Chris Conley is a seasoned executive with extensive experience in the telecommunications and data center industries. Currently serving as the Chief Revenue Officer at Evocative Data Centers, Chris leads the company's efforts in driving revenue growth through strategic sales and go-to-market initiatives.

Prior to Evocative, Chris was the CRO at Evoque Data Centers, where he contributed significantly to their market expansion. His previous roles include Senior Vice President of Enterprise Sales at Evoque Data Center, and General Manager and Vice President at CenturyLink, where he led significant growth initiatives across Texas and Oklahoma.

Chris's career is distinguished by his leadership in developing high-performance sales teams and fostering a culture of innovation and collaboration. His expertise spans managing large-scale operations and delivering complex IT and network solutions to diverse industries including retail, energy, healthcare, and financial services.
Chief Revenue Officer
Renee Lawrence
Renée Lawrence is responsible for Evocative’s global marketing organization, brand strategy, corporate communications, product marketing and management, field and partner marketing, and insights and analytics. Renée is a technology executive with extensive experience in data center operations, IT infrastructure technologies, managed services, product lifecycle management, and global channel development.

Prior to joining Evocative, Renée held senior marketing, product management, operations and global alliance roles with GlobalCenter, Exodus Communications, Savvis (now Lumen), EMC Corporation, and VCE. Renée has an MBA from the University of San Diego, a BA from the University of California, San Diego, and studied Strategic Marketing Management at Stanford University Graduate School of Business.
Vice President, Marketing & Product
Tony Hansel
In his role, Mr. Hansel is responsible for all of the company’s legal, corporate governance, and compliance matters. Mr. Hansel brings over 25 years of legal experience as a practicing attorney in the digital infrastructure industry. 

Prior to joining Evocative, he served as General Counsel for EXA Infrastructure and as senior vice president of legal, compliance, and government regulatory matters for GTT Communications. 

Earlier in his career, Mr. Hansel served as in-house counsel for Net2000 Communications, Covad Communications, and MegaPath, and as a lawyer in private practice with Swidler Berlin LLP (now Morgan Lewis) in Washington, DC. He started his career as an electrical engineer at SRA International, a technology consulting company.
General Counsel
Jay Smith
A pioneer in data center infrastructure development, Evocative is proud to have Jay Smith as the company’s Vice President, Data Center Operations and Engineering. Jay has over 25 years of experience in telecommunication and data center management including deep knowledge of voice and data communication, fiber optic connectivity, data center design, colocation, managed services and related technologies.

Prior to joining Evocative, Jay was the co-founder of Cyberverse. Established in 1994, Jay’s leadership over the past 25 years enabled Cyberverse to earn the reputation as one of the most trusted Internet infrastructure services companies in the industry.

Today, Jay is responsible for all Evocative data centers operations across the United States and consults with clients on determining the most appropriate combination of physical data center locations and customized infrastructure solutions to meet their specific needs.
Vice President, Data Center Operations and Engineering

Our Core Values

Evocative is a company that believes strongly in core values and how each and every member of our team embodies them. Our core values at Evocative help to guide everything that we do as an organization. These values include integrity, dedication, clear communication, and adaptability. The integrity, dedication, and commitment of our employees are crucial to Evocative because these core values inform everything we do.
Core Values

We are here to help, every day

At Evocative, we understand that your data is your business. Our services are designed with an architecture that’s not only secure and compliant, but also open and flexible. 

With Evocative, not only does your data stay private — you stay in total control of it, with the ability to facilitate the exchange of critical information across your hybrid and multi-cloud environments, with scalable solutions to choose from.