E-commerce platform provider Magento Commerce has hired Peter Sheldon, a Forrester Research Inc. vice president and e-commerce technology analyst, as head of strategy.

“As an independent company and with our milestone Magento 2.0 release now live in the hands of our customers, we have an incredible opportunity to disrupt the market,” Sheldon said Tuesday in a statement announcing his hiring. Magento’s newest software, in development for two years, became available Nov. 17.

41 of the companies in the B2B E-Commerce 300 list Magento as their e-commerce software provider. 178 of the top 1000 online retailers in North America use the free Community edition or the Enterprise version of the Magento e-commerce platform, according to Internet Retailer’s Top500Guide.com.

At Forrester, Sheldon led commerce technology research, including business-to-business and business-to-consumer e-commerce platforms, mobile commerce solutions, digital in-store technologies, and digital commerce. Prior to Forrester, Sheldon held product management and product marketing positions at e-commerce platform vendor Elastic Path. He also was a senior business analyst at JP Morgan and Ford Motor Co., where he started his e-commerce career developing a direct online channel for new vehicle sales in the United Kingdom. “I am very excited to have Peter on board. His deep industry expertise and experience advising global merchants and partners will be a great asset to our passionate ecosystem, from merchants and partners to developers,” said Mark Lenhard, Magento’s senior vice president of strategy and growth.

Magento Commerce became its own company in early November when eBay Inc.’s Enterprise unit formalized the spinoff of Magento Commerce and three other businesses—marketing solutions, customer relationship management, and enterprise operations and technology services. A consortium of buyers led by the Permira Funds, a London-based private equity investment group, and Sterling Partners, a Chicago-based private equity firm, acquired eBay Enterprise for $925 million. Permira then spun off the assets into Magento Commerce and eBay Enterprise Marketing Solutions.

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When eBay announced that deal earlier this year, Sheldon called Magento the “one of the jewels” of the investment portfolio, and that he expected the new owners to invest heavily in further developing its technology.

Magento plans to increase its marketing, emphasizing its open-source software that lets B2B companies and e-retailers own their applications, place the solution in their own network or in a public or private cloud, and upgrade or add custom solutions and third-party extensions at any time, CEO Mark Lavelle said in early November.

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