In association with heise online

05 February 2010, 15:18

Matt Asay becomes Canonical COO

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • submit to slashdot
  • StumbleUpon
  • submit to reddit

Matt Asay has left Alfresco and joined Canonical as its new Chief Operating Officer. Canonical announced that Asay would be taking the post with Canonical's current COO, Jane Silber, saying "we felt it critical to bring in a person who knew not just open source, but has a long experience in making Linux relevant to businesses and users alike".

Asay announced the news in his CNET blog, saying that he'd been offered the position by Mark Shuttleworth in a text message over Christmas. Asay says he had felt it had become difficult to make a meaningful contribution to Alfresco's development because "Alfresco runs so well now" and he was looking for a challenge. Asay will be filling the position which will be left vacant by Silber who's promotion to Canonical CEO was announced in December.

He will remain in Utah, while working on Canonical's "strategic goals and operational activities, the optimisation of day-to-day operations, and leadership of Canonical marketing and back-office functions" but will now be getting up at 4am Mountain Time (11am GMT)) so that he can synchronise with Canonical's UK offices.

Asay, who has been involved in open source since 1998, is known for his pragmatic position of software freedom, balancing the needs of companies and communities, and has sometimes been a contraversial blogger. He has previously worked at Lineo, an emebedded Linux startup, helped found Novell's Linux Business Office, founded the Open Source Business Conference and is an emeritus board member of the Open Source Initiative.

(djwm)

Print Version | Send by email | Permalink: http://h-online.com/-923419
 


  • July's Community Calendar





The H Open

The H Security

The H Developer

The H Internet Toolkit