Fister, others out at Cadence
Mike Fister is one of several executives that have abruptly resigned from Cadence just days before its Q3 announcement.
By Suzanne Deffree, Managing Editor, News -- EDN, October 15, 2008
Mike Fister will not be speaking on Cadence Design Systems Inc's Q3 financial call next week. As of today, he no longer works at the EDA company.
Fister is one of several executives that have abruptly resigned from Cadence. According to a statement from the company, the president and CEO's decision to exit was a mutual agreement between Fister and Cadence's board.
Fister came to the company from Intel in May 2004, replacing Ray Bingham.
The company has initiated a search for permanent president and CEO, but has set up an interim office of the chief executive to oversee day-to-day operations in the meantime. The interim office includes: John B. Shoven, Cadence board chairman, who has been appointed to the position of interim executive chairman; Lip-Bu Tan, a director of Cadence since 2004, who has been appointed interim vice chairman of Cadence’s board; and Kevin S Palatnik, senior VP and CFO. Charlie Huang, senior VP of business development at Cadence, has been named chief of staff of the interim office.
“Our board of directors believes that the formation of the interim office of the chief executive is the best structure to lead Cadence during this time of transition,” Shoven said in a statement this morning. “We remain focused on leveraging the company’s many strengths while continuing to fulfill the needs of our customers with compelling products and solutions. We believe strongly that Cadence has a solid foundation in place that positions the company for strong performance as economic and business trends improve.”
Cadence also announced that Kevin Bushby has resigned as executive VP of worldwide field operations, and has been succeed by Thomas Cooley, corporate VP of field marketing.
Further, James S Miller, Jr, executive VP of products and technologies organization; William Porter, executive VP and chief administrative officer, and RL Smith McKeithen, executive VP of corporate affairs, have resigned. Cadence said it does not intend to fill the three positions.
The resignations statements came as Cadence confirmed its Q3 estimates for total revenue between $235 million and $245 million and GAAP net loss per share between $0.27 and $0.25. The estimates compare to Cadence Q2 results that showed $329 million in revenue and GAAP net income of $0.02 per share.
To be true, Cadence is not alone in slowing sales and rising losses. EDA, like most other segments of the semiconductor industry has proven it is not immune to the current economic crisis. Indeed, the EDA Consortium last week reportedrevenue for the EDA industry in Q2 declined 3.7% to $1.36 billion from $1.41 billion in Q2 2007.
The resignations also came after a failed acquisition attempt by Cadence. In June, the San Jose-based company launched a $1.6 billion bid for its EDA rival Mentor Graphics. Mentor’s management and board rejected the bid, which Cadence withdrew in September.
Cadence is slated to report its Q3 financial results on October 22.
