30 Notable IT Executive Moves: October 2012

October Surprises

Some big moves in October eclipsed even the run of notable IT executive moves from September, and included some big changes at marquee tech companies like Apple, Symantec, EMC, Cisco, Juniper and VMware. Here's a look at some of the notables.

Scott Forstall

In one of the biggest executive shake-ups at Apple in ages -- and the first major realignment since Tim Cook succeeded the late Steve Jobs as CEO -- Scott Forstall, the head of Apple's iOS software unit, departed the company in late October. Forstall was said to have disagreed with Cook and other Apple managers over the handling of its faulty Maps app in iOS 6.

Another major ouster from Apple happened at the same time: John Browett, brought in six months ago to head Apple's retail operations, was asked to leave after he "failed to fit in," according to reports.

Jonathan Chadwick

Microsoft's loss was VMware's gain in the case of Jonathan Chadwick, who in mid-October joined VMware as CFO. Chadwick, who was a corporate vice president of Microsoft and CFO of Skype and previously held executive and financial roles at McAfee and Cisco, succeeded Mark Peek, who left VMware in June.

John Chen

John Chen had managed Sybase for 15 years and continued to lead the company after its 2010 acquisition by SAP. But in late October, Chen's time with Sybase came to a close because, according to a statement, it was "time to take on a new challenge."

William Robbins

It's been a year of significant shake-up for security software and storage giant Symantec, which replaced CEO Enrique Salem with new CEO Steve Bennett over the summer. Among the latest changes to Symantec's executive team since Bennett's ascent was the ouster of William Robbins, executive vice president of worldwide sales. Symantec plans to reorganize its sales teams into regional groups, each reporting to Bennett, rather than name a new global sales boss.

B.J. Jenkins

Barracuda Networks has a new leader in B.J. Jenkins, a longtime EMC executive who was most recently president of the storage giant's backup and recovery systems division. Barracuda, which specializes in email and web security appliances as well as application delivery and data protection, had been without a CEO since the July resignation of former chief executive Dean Drako.

John Roese

John Roese was a public face of Huawei's efforts to expand into North America, but in early October, Roese jumped ship to EMC, where he is now chief technology officer. Roese's Huawei title was senior vice president and general manager, Huawei North American R&D. Earlier in his career, he held CTO roles at Nortel, Broadcom, Enterasys and Cabletron.

Juniper EVPs

It's hard to say exactly what's ailing Juniper, but the company's significant restructuring -- intended to remove at least $150 million in expense during its next year -- has also seen a planned parting of ways with four EVP-level executives in the last months. Transitioning out of Juniper are Stefan Dyckerhoff (pictured), EVP, platform systems division, Mark Bauhaus, EVP, service, support and operations, John Morris, EVP, strategic alliances, and R.K. Anand, EVP and general manager, data center.

Steve Dodenhoff

Channel bigwig Insight Enterprises added a new manager at the top: Steve Dodenhoff, who in early October became president of the company's U.S. operations right under Ken Lamneck, president and CEO. Dodenhoff joined Insight in January as senior vice president of human resources and business development, and was previously at Enghouse Interactive, Integrated Information Systems and MicroAge.

Ari Jaaksi

Ari Jaaksi's cut an interesting path in the last few years, having transitioned from Nokia, where he'd spent 12 years and most recently led software, hardware and user experience, to HP, where he was senior vice president of WebOS software and services. Jaaksi's latest port of call, however, is McAfee, where in October he was named SVP and general manager, Mobile Engineering and Operations.

Jai Menon

Onward and upward for Jai Menon, well known as an IBM fellow and CTO, who exited Big Blue in the summertime but only recently began to make public his move to become CTO for Dell's Enterprise Solutions Business. Menon is one of several major recent executive additions for Dell, which is continuing to remake its executive team with veterans from other large tech companies.

Henrique De Castro

You had to think that when Marissa Mayer took over as CEO of Yahoo, she'd be able to lure a couple of her former Google colleagues over to help right the Yahoo ship. One of the biggest names so far is Henrique De Castro, named Yahoo's chief operating officer in mid-October. De Castro had most recently been Google's president, partners business solutions, but according to regulatory filings, stands to make up to $56 million in compensation at Yahoo.