A former executive from Irvine business software maker Epicor Software Corp. landed a chief executive gig in Northern California, according to a report.
Menlo Park-based Kana Software Inc. named Mark Duffell as president and chief executive, replacing Michael Fields, who is stepping down for health reasons, according to a report in the San Francisco Business Times.
Duffell left Epicor in 2008 after being passed up for a promotion to the top spot by Chief Executive George Klaus.
Duffell, Epicor’s former president and chief operating officer, and Michael Piraino, Epicor’s former chief financial officer, together launched Laguna Hills-based startup M2 Technology Partners LLC later that year.
M2 Technology Partners landed an investment by Menlo Park-based Accel-KKR LLC, an investment fund backed by private equity firms KKR & Co. of New York and Accel Partners of Palo Alto.
M2 is known as a “roll-up” company. It buys up and combines smaller companies to create a privately held business software maker.
Accel-KKR provides funding for the acquisitions, but didn’t disclose how much it’s invested in M2.
Kana, a maker of customer service software, was taken private by Accel-KKR via M2 Technologies back in October for about $50 million.
