I don’t know what’s going on at Twitter these days, but the company has becoming a revolving door of executives lately.
Only weeks after losing its Chief Operating Officer, as well as its Vice President of Media, the social communications network has now lost Chief Financial Officer Mike Gupta as well, it was revealed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Well, “lost” may not exactly be the right word, since Gupta is staying with the company. Its just that he will be Senior Vice President of Strategic Investments instead.
Gupta’s replacement has already been announced: it will be Anthony Noto, who was previously the Managing Director in the Technology, Media and Telecom Investment Banking Group at Goldman, Sachs. Prior to that he was CFO of the National Football League.
As the company’s new CFO, Noto will be paid $250,000. He will also be getting a one-time stock award for 1,500,00) shares of Twitter common stock vesting over 4 years, as well as a one-time option grant to buy another 500,000 shares.
The two men will be taking on their new roles within the next 30 days.
No official reason has been given for Gupta’s move, nor was it revealed whether this idea originated from Gupta or from Twitter. VatorNews has reached out to Twitter to find out more, but the company was unavailable for comment at this time.
Either way, Gupta is certainly putting a good face on it, as you’d expect he would:
Thanks @dickc Thrilled to start my new role as Head of Strategic Investments. Looking forward to having @anthonynoto on the team
— Mike Gupta (@mgupta) July 1, 2014
Twitter executives
Since going public last year, Twitter has not been in the best of shape. The company has seen its stock price drop as a result of slowing user growth. At the same time, it has also seen many of its higher-ups either leave the company, or move positions.
Back in January, former VP of Consumer Product, Michael Sippey, was moved into an advisory position. And last month, engineering SVP Chris Fry departed the company.
This past month, the company lost two key figures: first, it was COO Ali Rowghani who resigned. He was then followed out the door by Chloe Sladden, its VP of Media.
Rowghani’s duties were split between two other executives: Adam Bain, who had been head of revenue at the company, was given the addition title of head of business development. And Gabriel Stricker, who had been vice president of marketing and communications, was put in charge of overseeing the entire media team at Twitter.
As investors have been fretting over Twitter’s user numbers, the hiring of Noto could be strategic in two ways, as TechCrunch points out: first, his Wall Street experience gives the company an effective spokesperson, and one that can talk the investor’s language. Secondly, his experience in the NFL could help Twitter break into the sports world, which would give it a leg up on advertising opportunities.
(Image source: businessinsider.com)
