Tessera CEO Steps Down

Business Wire: Henry R. Nothhaft resigned as Tessera's CEO and president to pursue his advocacy of smart innovation policies in Washington, as presented in his recently-released book Great Again – Revitalizing America’s Entrepreneurial Leadership (Harvard Business Press). The company’s Board of Directors appointed Robert A. Young, Ph.D., as its new president and CEO.

Young has served as a member of Tessera’s board of directors since its inception in 1991. He has had a broad career including 17 years at IBM Corporation, where he held various executive positions. Subsequently, Young served as the managing partner of Dillon, Read & Co., Inc.’s venture capital operation before serving as Dillon, Read & Co.’s head of Technology Banking. He has a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.S. with honors in chemistry from the University of Delaware.

"This is a very exciting time in the company’s history, given the opportunities we see to maximize long-term shareholder value," said Young. "The investments made in the last several years have positioned us well to take advantage of two rapidly growing and changing markets: consumer optics and intellectual property. The board has initiated efforts to re-structure the businesses to take full advantage of these emerging opportunities."

PS: In case you are wondering what has happened with yesterday's Panasonic post, there is a major crash in Blogger database. The posting was disabled for some time and some posts are being recovered from backups now. I hope the Panasonic post will be back soon.