GameStop, the company whose stock has caused a sensation among day traders this year, said on Friday that Jenna Owens agreed to leave, just seven months after joining the video game retailer as chief operating officer.
This is GameStop’s first major executive departure since it hired new CEO Matt Furlong in June.
Owens worked as an executive at Amazon and Alphabet’s Google, and joined GameStop in March. She was one of the tech veterans recruited by Ryan Cohen, the co-founder and former CEO of online pet food retailer Chewy, who laid the foundation for turning a dying brick-and-mortar retailer into an e-commerce giant.
GameStop did not provide a reason for Owens’ departure, which is effective immediately. The company stated in a regulatory document that it had reached a “spin-off agreement” with Owens, which usually negotiated when the company and its executives disagreed.
Earlier this year, GameStop also used a separation agreement when it parted ways with CFO Jim Bell and CEO George Sherman. They were replaced by Furlong as Chief Executive Officer and Mike Recupero as Chief Financial Officer.
The document stated that Owens would be entitled to severance pay. Her responsibilities will be assumed by other GameStop senior managers.
The company declined to comment outside of the submitted documents. Owens could not be reached immediately for comment.
Cohen and two other former Chewy executives joined GameStop’s board of directors in January, just before retail investors poured into the company’s stock and pushed it up more than 2,500%. These stocks have already given up some of their earnings, and GameStop is now valued at approximately US$14 billion (approximately Rs 1,049.133 crore).
Since becoming chairman in June, Cohen has been actively promoting the improvement of customer experience, but did not provide a detailed plan on how GameStop will achieve its digital transformation.
The Grapevine, Texas-based company sells game consoles. The video game business faces competition from streaming services, such as Apple’s streaming services, which allow users to play on TVs without the need for game consoles. video games.
Cohen recruited several executives from Amazon, including Furlong and Elliott Wilkie, who joined in March as chief growth officer.
Public records and documents show that the company has hired dozens of new executives with supply chain and technology backgrounds from companies such as Chewy and e-commerce company Zulily.
Two sources said that Cohen and Furlong also fired several senior employees who were not suitable for their system in recent months.
© Thomson Reuters 2021