Juniper Networks today named Bikash Koley as its new chief technology officer, reporting to CEO Rami Rahim. Koley will join Juniper in August.

Koley is the head of network architecture, engineering, and planning at Google. He is an expert on the topics of software-defined networking (SDN), packet and optical network integration, warehouse-scale computing, and large-scale data center interconnection. He designed Google's production network infrastructure, spanning data center, backbones, optical, and the content edge. His team also oversaw Google's SDN evolution.

"Bikash is a visionary who has been architecting and operating networks of the future at Google for the past 10 years,” said Rahim in a statement.

Koley fills the shoes of Juniper Networks’ Founder Pradeep Sindhu. In February Sindhu said he planned to transition from CTO to the role of chief scientist at Juniper and devote more time to his position as CEO of Fungible, a company he started in 2015.

As CTO, Koley will be responsible for charting Juniper's technology strategy. He’ll also lead and execute several of the company's critical technology innovations, including Contrail and AppFormix, the company said in today’s announcement.

In a prepared statement, Koley said, "I have admired Juniper Networks' technology for the last two decades and believe the technology within Juniper will lend itself to an amazing programmable platform that will allow companies to operate seamless hybrid cloud infrastructures. Harmonious connectivity to clouds is not a solved problem, and I look forward to being part of the new era of networking.”