After a successful launch weekend that saw 50,000 to 100,000 Palm Pre's sold (depending on the report), Jon Rubinstein will be replacing Ed Colligan as Chief Executive Officer, effective June 12th. Often referred to as the "Prefather," Rubinstein left Apple for Palm in 2006 and was highly influential in the development of the Pre and the webOS platform. During his tenure with Apple, he helped develop the all-in-one iMac and the iPod. In an interview a short time ago, Rubinstein discussed how his time at Apple affected his decisions at Palm, noting that ?Palm's engineering culture has a lot of how Apple runs instilled into it.? The full press release regarding the leadership change is below.
SUNNYVALE, Calif., Jun 10, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Palm, Inc.
(Nasdaq: PALM) today announced that its board of directors has
appointed Jon Rubinstein to lead the company as Chairman and CEO upon
the departure of Ed Colligan, who is stepping down after sixteen years
of leadership at the company. Rubinstein, who joined Palm as Executive
Chairman in October 2007 to help bring innovation back to the company,
assumes his role as CEO on June 12. Colligan plans to take some time
off, then join Elevation Partners.
"I am very excited about
taking on this expanded role at Palm," said Rubinstein. "Ed and I have
worked very hard together the past two years, and I'm grateful to him
for everything he's done to help set the company up for success. With
Palm webOS we have ten-plus years of innovation ahead of us, and the
Palm Pre is already one of the year's hottest new products. Due in no
small part to Ed's courageous leadership, we're in great shape to get
Palm back to continuous growth, and we plan to keep the trajectory
going upward."
"I'm very proud of what Palm has accomplished so
far," said Colligan. "We pioneered two major product categories and I
believe we are on our way to defining the standard for the mobile web.
I'm extremely proud of our team, and grateful to have played a role in
turning Palm around. I know that Jon, the Board and the Palm executive
team will do an incredible job driving Palm to new heights."
Source: PreCentral
