Tech’s hot jobs gobbled by recession

[VelMurugan]

Tech's hot jobs gobbled by recession

It is not only the ordinary employees who are losing their jobs in the current recession, many top execs too are at the receiving end. The past few months have seen many high-profile tech execs fall prey to the deepening economic slowdown.

Many top jobs succumbed to companies recording poor revenues, others (not-so-direct ones) faced axe in management reshuffles.

Here's looking into some of the high and mighty job causalities of the global economic slowdown.


Source : IndiaTimes

[VelMurugan]

William Amelio, Lenovo

Lenovo CEO, William Amelio, quit after the company announced a $96.7 million quarterly loss in February this year.

Amelio resigned after a management reshuffle and has been succeeded by chairman Yang Yuanqing. Co-founder Liu Chuanzhi would return as chairman, replacing Yang.

The company's global sales fell 20 per cent in the three months ending December 31 2008 compared to year before. A former Dell executive, Amelio led the broad restructuring of Lenovo's worldwide operations. He is the second American CEO to step down since Lenovo completed its acquisition of IBM's former PC division in 2004.

The company said in a statement, "The group's results were impacted principally by slowdown of the Chinese PC market in which it has significant market share and demand reduction in the worldwide commercial PC segment."

[VelMurugan]

Paul Liska, Motorola

Motorola Inc, the second-biggest US seller of mobile phones, said it fired Chief Financial Officer Paul Liska for cause after less than a year on the job.

Liska, hired in February 2008, was "involuntarily terminated," the Schaumburg, Illinois-based company said in a regulatory filing. Liska's departure was first disclosed on February 3, no reason was given at the time.

Paul Liska, however, has sued the company in county court in Chicago, claiming that it was a "retaliatory discharge." Motorola, which awarded Liska $3.65 million in salary, bonuses, stock and options in 2008, is asking him to repay the $400,000 signing bonus he received last year. The company, however, declined to comment on the reason Liska was fired.

Motorola has struggled to rebound from a decline in market share and an industry slowdown, posting two years of losses. The company has cut jobs, frozen US pension plans and trimmed executive pay to lower costs. Motorola suspended its dividend last month for the first time in six decades and projected a bigger-than-anticipated loss this quarter.

[VelMurugan]

Hector Ruiz, AMD

Another big slowdown causality is Hector Ruiz, who stepped down as CEO AMD, in July last year. He was replaced by president and COO, Dirk Meyer. Before stepping down as CEO, Ruiz had been the only person to head AMD other than founder and longtime Chief Executive Jerry Sanders.

The handoff from Ruiz to Meyer came as the chip maker -- the world's no. 2 maker of personal-computer microprocessors, behind Intel Corp -- was facing a cash crunch that threatened its survival.

AMD has racked up nearly $7 billion in losses over the last nine quarters amid a punishing slowdown in PC sales, which drags down processor demand, and as the company has paid down huge debt from its $5.6 billion acquisition of graphics chip maker ATI Technologies. In 2008, AMD lost $3.1 billion on sales of $5.8 billion.

Another part of AMD's restructuring has been cutting executives' pay and eliminating 3,300 jobs.

[VelMurugan]

Blake Jorgensen, Yahoo

After spending six weeks diagnosing Yahoo Inc's troubles, new Chief Executive Carol Bartz started to prescribe a cure with a management shake-up that included ouster of the Internet company's chief financial officer, Blake Jorgensen.

The broad reorganization plan aims to dismantle what Bartz calls the "silos" that had slowed down the Internet company. The overhaul expanded the responsibilities of Yahoo's chief technology officer, Ari Balogh, and the company's top advertising executive in the United States, Hilary Schneider. Bartz also created two jobs: a chief marketing officer and her own chief of staff.

Jorgensen will remain CFO until Bartz find replacement. Jorgensen is paid a salary of $500,000, according to Yahoo's most recent disclosures about executive compensation. The terms of his severance package weren't disclosed.

With the new pecking order, Bartz hopes to speed up Yahoo's decision-making and have a senior team that supports her strategy for turning around a company struggling with three years of declining profits - a downturn that had battered its stock price well before the market's overall decline.

[VelMurugan]

William Roper, VeriSign

Last year, VeriSign CEO William Roper quit as an officer and director effective from June 30. Strangely the company did not specify any reason for the change, nor did they give any details on plans to install a permanent replacement.

On an interim basis, the company named James Bidzos as chairman, CEO and president. Bidzos is the company's founder and original CEO; he has been chairman or vice chairman since April 1995.

In the announcement, Bidzos said that the company will proceed with its plan to divest non-core operations. Roper was appointed in May 2007 after former CEO Stratton Sclavos also abruptly resigned from the position. The company said Bidzos will remain at the helm while VeriSign searches for a CEO and president.

The resignation came at a time when the company hinted that it would begin selling off some of its business units, such as its communications division, which focuses on routing and a billing processing unit for wireless providers.

Recently, the company reported a fourth-quarter profit of $38.9 million, or 20 cents per share, compared with a loss of $219.2 million, or 98 cents per share, in the year-earlier quarter.

[VelMurugan]

Bertrand Cambou, Spansion

Flash memory chip maker Spansion Inc's president and chief executive, Bertrand Cambou, resigned as chip sales falter. Cambou was replaced by John Kispert, the former president of KLA-Tencor Corp.

On March 1 the struggling memory maker and its US subsidiaries filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in an effort to restructure $625 million worth of debt as the company continues to explore a possible sale or other alternatives.

The news comes a week after Spansion, one of the world's largest makers of chips used in digital cameras, cell phones and high-definition televisions, said it would slash its global work force by 35 per cent, or 3,000 employees.

California-based Spansion, founded in 1993, was a joint venture between chip-maker Advanced Micro Devices and Fujitsu. In January, Spansion s

[VelMurugan]

Jerry Yang, Yahoo

After a rocky tenure at Yahoo, co-founder Jerry Yang stepped down as chief executive last November.

Among the Silicon Valley dotcom billionaires, Yang was named CEO in June 2007 after Terry Semel exit. As CEO, Yang struggled to turn around the company's dwindling fortunes. The rejection of Microsoft offer and a failed advertising deal with Google marred his brief tenure.

Last year, Yang rejected a $33 per share offer from Microsoft for Yahoo worth a total of more than $47 billion. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer later withdrew the offer after Yang sought $37 per share. The breaking down of negotiations triggered shareholder revolt led by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who called for Yang's ouster in July. Since then Yahoo has been trading at between $10-12 a share.

With a fortune estimated at $2.23 billion, some shareholders accused Yang of putting his personal affection for the company he created over the interests of its shareholders. After squandering the opportunity to sell to Microsoft, Yang tried to boost Yahoo's profit by forging an advertising partnership with Google.

But this backup plan too fell when Google walked away from the deal to avoid a court battle with the US Justice Department, which concluded that the partnership may throttle competition in the online advertising market.

[VelMurugan]

Ryoji Chubachi, Sony

Sony Corp Chief Executive Officer and Chairman Howard Stringer will replace Ryoji Chubachi as president, tightening his control over the Japanese electronic giant as it faces a record loss.

Stringer, 67, will also take over the running of the main electronics business from Chubachi while retaining his existing roles from April 1. Chubachi, 61, will become vice chairman in charge of product safety, quality and environmental issues.

The removal of Chubachi, who joined Sony in 1977, from its mainstay operation gives Stringer more leeway to reorganise the company as the global recession erodes sales. Sony is cutting 16,000 workers, including 8,000 from the electronics division, and is forecasting a record full-year operating loss of 260 billion yen ($2.7 billion).

"This reorganization is designed to transform Sony into a more innovative, integrated and agile global company with its next generation of leadership firmly in place," Stringer said in a statement.

[VelMurugan]

Kazuo Furukawa, Hitachi

After forecasting a record loss, Hitachi Ltd announced the replacement of its president. Takashi Kawamura, 69, will assume Kazuo Furukawa's role starting April 1, the Tokyo-based company said.

Kawamura currently serves as chairman at Hitachi Maxell Ltd, a unit making rechargeable batteries and compact discs, and Hitachi Plant Technologies Ltd, which produces water-treatment systems and industrial machinery, the company said.

Hitachi also plans to separate its two business units. Its automotive systems and consumer units on July 1 and reduce costs by 500 billion yen ($5.1 billion) in the 12 months ending March 31, 2010.

The overhaul adds to job cuts of as many as 7,000 positions at Hitachi after the company in January forecast it will post a record 700 billion yen loss in the year ending March 31.

Revenue at the company's automotive systems group, comprising lithiumion batteries, inverters and small-size motors, will total 280 billion yen next fiscal year, Hitachi said, equivalent to about 2.8 percent of total sales forecast for this year. The new company will employ about 2,700 workers.

Sales at the consumer operations division, including plasma televisions, liquid-crystal displays for industrial use and mobile phones, will total about 160 billion yen next fiscal year, or 1.6 percent of overall fiscal 2008 revenue. The unit will employ 750 workers.

[VelMurugan]

Toon Bouten, Netcom

After posting fourth quarter operating profit slightly below consensus, Danish hearing aid and headset maker GN Store Nord said it would not renew the contract of its Netcom chief executive Toon Bouten.

Jens Bille Bergholdt, vice president for investor relations at GN, declined to say whether Netcom's difficulties were the reason for not renewing chief executive Bouten's contract.

"It was equally his own decision for personal reasons and tax reasons," he said, declining to answer if GN tried to convince Bouten to stay or when GN would start to look for his replacement.

The company reported operating profit of 27 million Danish crowns ($4.61 million). GN said this year's operating profit would be in line with that of 2008.

The company expects headset unit Netcom to post an operating loss of 100 million crowns this year as sales drop 17 per cent to 2 billion crowns.

GN has been struggling to turn its business around since German competition authorities blocked the sale of its ReSound hearing aid unit to Switzerland's Sonova in 2007 for $2.8 billion. The total market value of the entire company is just 2.3 billion crowns now.