Salesforce CEO Benioff shakes up top ranks – source

10:56 pm Tuesday, June 06th, 2023

By Akriti Sharma and Kanjyik Ghosh

(Reuters) -Salesforce Inc CEO Marc Benioff has shuffled the top management, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday, a move that follows after the software company reported its slowest quarterly revenue growth since 2010.

Miguel Milano has been appointed as the chief revenue officer, the source said, adding that Ariel Kelman will take over as Salesforce’s chief marketing officer.

After a previous tenure of nearly a decade at Salesforce, Milano will make a return from his recent position at software company Celonis. Kelman has previously served as CMO at Amazon Web Services and Oracle.

Kendall Collins, who will step into the role of chief of staff for Benioff, had worked as CMO at Okta and Cisco’s AppDynamics.

Salesforce President and Chief Operating Officer Brian Millham would be assuming new duties such as marketing, employee success and business technology, the source said.

Salesforce did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the appointments.

News website Insider, which first reported the moves citing a memo earlier in the day, suggested that Millham’s new role positions him as a top contender to succeed Benioff as his successor.

The appointments at Salesforce come amid mounting pressure from activist investors, including ValueAct, Inclusive Capital, and Starboard Value, who have been advocating for operational improvements, cost-control initiatives, and enhanced efficiencies over the past several months.

Earlier this year, Salesforce announced plans to close some offices and cut jobs by 10% after the pandemic-induced hiring left the company with a bloated workforce.

Growth at major cloud players from Microsoft Corp to Amazon.com Inc has come under pressure this year as businesses undertake belt-tightening measures to weather the impact of rising interest rates and a potential economic slowdown.

(Reporting by Kanjyik Ghosh and Akriti Sharma in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Anirudh Saligrama in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)