The company's COO and CMO have left, with no replacements named
BlackBerry's chief operating, marketing and financial officers are leaving as recently appointed CEO John Chen makes his mark on the struggling mobile vendor.
Chief Operating Officer Kristian Tear, Chief Marketing Officer Frank Boulben and Chief Financial Officer Brian Bidulka all are leaving BlackBerry, the company announced on Monday. James Yersh, the former controller and head of compliance, will take over the top financial spot.
No replacements were named for Tear or Boulben, who both were hired by ousted CEO Thorsten Heins in May 2012 as BlackBerry geared up for the launch of BlackBerry 10 smartphones and a renewed consumer marketing effort. BlackBerry 10 didn't launch until the following January, and the company has since moved away from the consumer business.
"I look forward to working more directly with the talented teams of engineers, and the sales and marketing teams around the world to facilitate the BlackBerry turn-around and to drive innovation," Chen said in a press release. Departing CFO Bidulka, who worked at BlackBerry for eight years, will remain as a special adviser to assist with the transition for the rest of the company's fiscal year.
BlackBerry named Chen as CEO on Nov. 4, the same day the company said it would accept a US$1 billion loan from a consortium of investors but drop plans to sell itself. Under Heins, BlackBerry had pinned its hopes on the BlackBerry 10 platform but ended up taking an inventory charge of nearly $1 billion that was mostly associated with the recently introduced Z10 handset.
"I will continue to align my senior management team and organizational structure, and refine the company's strategy," Chen said in the press release.
He is the former CEO of Sybase, which entered the mobile market under Chen and was later sold to SAP.
Also on Monday, BlackBerry announced the resignation of board member Roger Martin, who had served since 2007.
Stephen Lawson covers mobile, storage and networking technologies for The IDG News Service. Follow Stephen on Twitter at @sdlawsonmedia. Stephen's e-mail address is stephen_lawson@idg.com
Marketers have made strides this year in sustainability with the number of brands rallying behind the Not Business As Usual alliance for action against climate change being a sign of the times. While sustainability efforts have gained momentum this year, 2020 is shaping up to be the year brands are really held accountable for their work in this area.
As a Marketer, the ‘Scotty from Marketing’ meme troubles me.
Clients and agencies can get stuck into a particular way of behaving and viewing the world, but there are ways to break out of our marketing echo chamber.
In this bonus last episode of this new podcast series, BrandHook MD, Pip Stocks, talks with former ANZ group general manager of marketing, Louise Eyres, talks about the importance of thinking like a customer and using intuition to solve customer painpoints.
It's a good idea. Customers really should control their data. Now I understand why it's important.
Elvin Huntsberry
Salesforce CMO: Modern marketers have an obligation to give customers control of their data
Instagram changes algorithms every time you get used to them. It really pisses me off. What else pisses me off? The fact that Instagram d...
Nickwood
Instagram loses the like in Australia; industry reacts positively
I tried www.analisa.io to see my Instagram Insight
Dina Rahmawati
7 marketing technology predictions for 2016
The saying is pretty tongue in cheek. It's not saying that marketers are bad people, nor that they don't take themselves seriously. There...
LYF Solutions
The trouble with Scotty from Marketing - The CMO view - CMO Australia
Given Scotty's failed track-record in the marketing realm the memes and the ridicule is very apt and is in no way a reflection on marketi...
denysf
The trouble with Scotty from Marketing - The CMO view - CMO Australia