Rocket Fuel Announces CEO Succession Plan
March 24 2015 - 4:45PM
Business Wire
Company Initiates CEO Search; George John to
Remain as Chairman; Monte Zweben Named Interim CEO
Rocket Fuel Reiterates First Quarter 2015
Guidance
Rocket Fuel Inc. (NASDAQ:FUEL), a leading programmatic
media-buying platform provider that uses artificial intelligence
(AI) at Big Data scale to improve marketing ROI for global agencies
and enterprise marketers, today announced it will begin the process
to identify a successor to the company’s Chief Executive Officer,
George John.
Mr. John, a co-founder who has led the company since 2008, will
remain Chairman of the Board and have an active role, focusing on
acquiring and developing strategic customer relationships. Monte
Zweben, an accomplished marketing and technology executive and
Rocket Fuel Board member since 2010, has been appointed interim CEO
while the company searches for a full-time replacement.
“After building an impressive next-generation executive staff,
the last piece of which was our new Chief Revenue Officer Randy
Wootton, I realized the time is right to identify a successor as
CEO to help Rocket Fuel achieve its financial goals and guide it
through its next stage of growth,” Mr. John said. “Managing Rocket
Fuel to profitability is a very different challenge than the
growth-focused mode of the past few years. Throughout his career
Monte has provided operational leadership through different stages
of corporate growth from start up companies to billion dollar
enterprises. He also shares the same passion for AI, Big Data,
marketing and technology that we all have at Rocket Fuel.”
Mr. John led Rocket Fuel from a concept in March 2008 to a
global public company with over $400 million in revenue from
software products and media products sold to ad agencies and
marketers. The company's 2014 revenue represented growth of 70%
over 2013, with 130% revenue retention from 2013 customers.
Deloitte ranked the company #1 on its Technology Fast 500 list in
2013, as the fastest-growing technology company in North America,
and #15 on the list for 2014.
“We are grateful for George’s exceptional leadership and his
contributions to Rocket Fuel’s growth,” said Clark Kokich, Rocket
Fuel’s Lead Independent Director. “Monte’s experience makes him the
ideal interim CEO to help the company achieve its financial goals
for 2015. With George serving in an active role driving strategic
customer development and acquisition, Rocket Fuel intends to
accelerate the realization of the Company’s long term vision to
expand its business by bringing a unified digital marketing
platform to agencies and enterprise marketers.”
The Board of Directors has formed a CEO search committee, of
which Mr. John is a member and will engage a leading executive
search firm to help identify candidates as expeditiously as
possible. Rocket Fuel is seeking a CEO with a proven track record
of success in scaling to a multi-billion dollar global company;
achieving and driving profitability; and global expertise in
bringing enterprise technology to market.
About Monte Zweben
Mr. Zweben has extensive experience in AI, Big Data, marketing
and media technology, enterprise software and public company
management. His early career was spent with the NASA Ames Research
Center’s Artificial Intelligence Branch. Mr. Zweben then founded
and was CEO of Red Pepper Software, a leading supply chain
optimization company, which merged with PeopleSoft. He then ran
PeopleSoft’s largest business unit as General Manager and Vice
President of its Manufacturing Business Unit. Mr. Zweben founded
and was CEO of Blue Martini Software – the leader in e-commerce and
multi-channel systems for marketing retailers. Following Blue
Martini, he was chairman of SeeSaw Networks, a digital, place-based
media company. Mr. Zweben’s newest venture, Splice Machine,
delivers the Hadoop RDBMS, an alternative to Oracle, to scale
real-time applications using commodity hardware without application
rewrites.
Mr. Zweben is the co-author of the book Intelligent Scheduling
and has published articles in the Harvard Business Review and
various computer science journals and conference proceedings. He
serves on the Dean’s Advisory Board for Carnegie-Mellon
University’s School of Computer Science. Mr. Zweben has a B.S. in
Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University and earned an M.S.
in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Business Outlook
The Company reiterates its business outlook for the first
quarter of 2015, which was originally provided in a press release
dated February 19, 2015.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains "forward-looking statements,"
regarding future events and our future financial performance,
including but not limited to: the company's forecast of certain
financial results for the first quarter of 2015; the intended
impact of the company’s management changes including strategic
customer development and acquisition, the achievement of financial
goals and the realization of the company’s long term vision; and
the promptness with which the CEO Search Committee can identify an
executive search firm and candidates. Words such as "expect,"
"believe," "anticipate," “intend”, "plan", “goal”, and other
similar words are also intended to identify such forward-looking
statements.
These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of
risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ
materially from the results anticipated by such statements,
including, without limitation, unanticipated delays in appointing a
permanent CEO; our limited operating history, particularly as a
relatively new public company; our history of losses; fluctuations
in our operating results; failure to achieve a unified digital
marketing platform marketable to agencies and enterprise marketers,
and expected synergies and efficiencies of operations between
Rocket Fuel and [x+1]; the loss of any key customers or employees;
the success of any cost control or reduction efforts we undertake;
the ability of our sales force to increase productivity; and
general market, political, economic and business conditions.
Additional factors that could cause actual results to differ
materially from those anticipated by our forward-looking statements
are under the caption "Risk Factors" in our Annual Report on Form
10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 16,
2015. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of
this press release, and Rocket Fuel expressly disclaims any
obligation or undertaking to update the forward-looking statements
contained herein to reflect events that occur or circumstances that
exist after the date on which the statements were made.
About Rocket Fuel
Rocket Fuel combines the science of Artificial Intelligence with
the scale of Big Data to improve the effectiveness of programmatic
marketing. Customers trust Rocket Fuel's Marketing That Learns®
platform to achieve brand and direct-response objectives in diverse
industries across North America, Latin America, Europe, and APAC.
With the acquisition of marketing technology firm [x+1] in
September of 2014, Rocket Fuel now offers a complete digital
marketing hub for the world's most innovative, always-on marketers.
The hub includes data management, programmatic media-buying, site
optimization, and predictive analytics capabilities that extend
across a marketer's paid and owned channels, and personalize every
customer interaction. Rocket Fuel operates in more than 20 offices
worldwide and trades on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the
ticker symbol "FUEL." For more information, please visit
http://www.rocketfuel.com or call 1-888-717-8873.
Rocket FuelKenya Hayes, 650-481-6178pr@rocketfuel.com
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