Hasta La Gadget!

The high-level shakeups aren’t over at BlackBerry just because the company has a new CEO. The company has just let go of Chief Operating Officer Kristian Tear (pictured at left) and Chief Marketing Officer Frank Boulben (right), both of whom had assumed their roles roughly one year ago. There’s no mention of immediate replacements. The Waterloo firm is also replacing Chief Financial Officer Brian Bidulka with the company’s Compliance head James Yersh; Bidulka will stay on as an advisor for the rest of the fiscal year to ease the transition. CEO John Chen hasn’t provided explanations for the individual departures, but he describes the executive shuffle as necessary for focusing on BlackBerry’s “core strength” in mobile device management. Let’s just hope that Chen is better at engineering a turnaround than his predecessors.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Blackberry

Comments

Marketwired

It could mean nothing, but it could mean everything. As of this morning, Bob Mansfield was still a senior vice president at one of the world’s most iconic technology firms. As of now, his leadership bio is nowhere to be found on Apple’s official web presence. If you’ll recall, Mansfield has had an interesting couple of years at Apple. In June of 2012, he abruptly announced that he was retiring. A couple of weeks later, he publicly addressed mounting criticism regarding Apple’s computers and their relationship with EPEAT, seemingly putting the kibosh on said retirement. A few weeks following that, Mansfield actually got a promotion, with his responsibilities growing once again during the executive shakeup of October 2012. It’s unclear if someone accidentally deleted the profile of one of Apple’s most important figureheads (read: unlikely), or if Mr. Mansfield truly has stepped aside, but we’ll be reaching out to Apple in hopes of clarifying things.

Update: Reuters‘ Poornima Gupta is reporting that Mansfield is “no longer with Apple’s executive team, but will remain at Apple working on special projects reporting to Tim Cook.”

Filed under: Software, Apple

Comments

Via: MacRumors

Source: Apple

Rumors of a massive reorg in Redmond have been floating around for awhile now. And the noise reached a fever pitch when Don Mattrick left Microsoft for Zygna’s (apparently) greener pastures — purportedly because he didn’t like the role he’d receive in the pending restructuring. Now, a mere ten days after the ex-Xbox chief’s departure, we know what the new Microsoft will look like.

As expected, the company has been bifurcated into services and devices divisions, with Julie Larson-Green getting the nod as hardware chief and Terry Myerson becoming the Grand Poobah of Windows. Of course, quite a few other execs have seen their roles shift as well, with Qi Lu managing productivity, communication and search apps and services, and Satya Nadella heading up the company’s cloud initiatives. Additionally, Skype president Tony Bates has been tapped to manage the Business Development and Evangelism group, where he’ll lead corporate strategy and developer outreach.

There are even more changes afoot. CTO Eric Rudder is now responsible for an Advanced Strategy and Research group and Tami Reller is the new US marketing chief. COO Kevin Turner, CFO Amy Hood, General Counsel Brad Smith and Chief People Officer Lisa Brummel will maintain their current positions. Finally, Office president Kurt DelBene will be retiring from Microsoft, according to the company-wide reorganization email published on the company’s site. So what this all this mean for MS? Hit up the source for a 2,700-word memo detailing Steve Ballmer’s vision.

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Tablets, Software, Microsoft

Comments

Via: AllThingsD

Source: Microsoft

So what’s next for Microsoft after the sudden departure of former Xbox chief Don Mattrick to lead Zynga? The move is reportedly related to an executive restructuring that will be announced soon, directed by CEO Steve Ballmer as part of a shift in strategy towards devices and services. Bloomberg sources suggest detailed plans of at least one possible version of the future, putting current Windows leader Julie Larson-Green at the head of hardware engineering for the company. That shift would also give Windows Phone corporate VP Terry Myerson more control over the Windows OS across platforms, and Skype president Tony Bates the lead in acquisitions and developer relations.

The report claims Mattrick was a contender for the hardware post before he left, while an earlier Fast Company article tied his exit directly to not receiving an expanded role once all the new seats are filled. The Wall Street Journal has its own speculation over who may take over all things Xbox — Marc Whitten,Yusuf Mehdi and Nancy Whitten are all name dropped — but if the rumors are true we could find out who is leading this new direction for Microsoft as soon as next week.

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Tablets, Mobile, Microsoft

Comments

Source: Bloomberg, Fast Company, Wall Street Journal

Ben Silbermann has found himself in a pretty swell spot. He’s the CEO of Pinterest — a company that was recently valued at $2.5 billion, despite not making a single cent to date. He took the stage today at D11 in Southern California, answering questions shot from Kara Swisher. One of the key points he made was on the topic of mobile. Swisher was asking about Pinterest’s mobile efforts, and Silbermann suggested that in the very near future, asking such a thing would be borderline silly. “It’d be like asking a business today if they’re a dot-com business,” he said, suggesting that every business created in 2013 should absolutely have some sort of presence on the web.

It’s perhaps due to the shocking uptake of Pinterest’s apps. Said Silbermann: “A growing number [of users] use Pinterest exclusively on their phone or tablet. When we released our mobile apps, we were taking bets on how long it’d take for those to surpass our web traffic. I figured it’d take a few weeks. It was literally the day it was released [that the traffic was passed]. I think it’s because phones and tablets are largely always around you, whereas you’re not always around a [traditional] computer.”

It’s perhaps the token example of how consumers at large are moving away from needing a full-fledged machine at their fingertips, and the redefining of what a “computer” is for the newest generations.

Filed under: Internet, Software

Comments