ARM CEO Warren East To Retire

After 12 years heading up British success story ARM Holdings, CEO Warren East is to retire on 30 June.

East has seen the company through a marvellous decade, which saw it grab the mobile chip market by the jugular and never let go. ARM designs are found in most popular tablets and smartphones today, including Apple iPhones. Meanwhile, the world’s biggest chip company, Intel, has been left struggling in the mobile space.

He has also overseen the company’s move into becoming a server chip designer. ARM is now gaining traction in the space, as manufacturers like Dell seek to push out more energy efficient servers. Intel rival AMD recently turned to ARM for new server chip designs.

East’s ARM successes

Revenues at ARM have jumped $700 million (not taking inflation into account) since 2001. A whopping 8.7 billion ARM-based chips were shipped in 2012, compared to 420 million in 2001. The employee base has shot up from 722 to 2,392. Last month, the company’s share price hit a record high on some fine Q4 results.

East joined ARM in 1994 to set up the company’s consulting business and later became vice president of business operations.

Simon Segars, president of ARM, will take over as CEO on 1 July. Segars has actually been at ARM longer than East – 22 years, compared to 19.

“ARM is a great company with a strong market position and a unique culture. We take a very long-term view about our business, and we believe that now is the right time to bring in new leadership, to execute on the next phase of growth and to plan even further into the future,” East said.

“I have worked with Simon in the senior leadership team for many years and we share a global perspective and belief in the ARM approach to partnership and collaboration; he is an excellent choice to lead ARM.”

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