Stan Shih, founder of Taiwan’s struggling personal computer maker Acer, will retire as chairman next month, six months after he returned to launch reforms
May 19, 2014 Leave a comment
Acer founder Shih now programmed for retirement
Monday, May 05, 2014
Stan Shih, founder of Taiwan’s struggling personal computer maker Acer, will retire as chairman next month, six months after he returned to launch reforms.
Acer yesterday confirmed that Shih will be stepping down on June 18. That is the day of its shareholders meeting, during which his successor will be elected.
The 69-year-old Shih had provided the surprise pointer to him preparing to step down during a gathering with the media, the United Evening News said.
That was when he said younger talents would be promoted to lead divisions as the company shifted its business focus from hardware to cloud computing – the company’s third major transformation since it came into being nearly 40 years ago.
Shih, who also said he expected Acer to “return to glory” three years from now, had in November replaced chairman and chief executive JT Wang and corporate president Jim Wong, who quit after Acer had a net third- quarter loss of NT$13.1 billion (HK$3.36 billion).
Then, in December, Shih relinquished his position of CEO and president to Jason Chen, a senior vice president of worldwide sales and marketing at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, the world’s leading contract microchip maker.
Senior executives also took voluntary salary cuts of 30 percent since January as Acer struggles.
After the founding in 1976 and becoming the world’s No2 PC maker, Acer’s fortunes have worsened in recent years with competition from Apple and others. AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
About bambooinnovator
Bamboo Innovator 