Sage Software Inc., an Irvine-based maker of business software and a unit of Britain’s Sage Group PLC, has seen changes of late.
The company is working through a bit of a shakeup in its upper ranks after it hired two executives and saw one step down.
Earlier this month, Sage hired Motasim Najeeb to be its technology chief and report to Chief Executive Sue Swenson.
Najeeb most recently held the chief technology officer and engineering posts at TradeBeam Inc., a San Mateo-based maker of global trade management software.
Before TradeBeam, he was vice president of enterprise applications at Oracle Corp.
Earlier in his career he helped start and run WebMD Health Corp. and helped grow the company to more than $300 million in yearly sales.
Last year Sage appointed Marc Loupe as finance chief, also reporting to Swenson.
Loupe spent nearly 20 years at Santa Clara-based Sun Microsystems Inc. His most recent position was senior vice president of finance with San Carlos-based XOJET Inc., which provides corporate jet timeshares.
“Sue has solidified her executive team,” said a spokeswoman for Sage.
Nina Smith, who was president of the business management division of Sage, stepped down in early December.
Smith was one of five women honored at the Business Journal’s Women in Business awards last year.
She headed a group of some 2,000 workers and spent more than seven years at Sage after 20 years with Xerox Corp.
The company didn’t say why she left.
A person familiar with the company said she may have butted heads with Swenson, a telecommunications veteran with a straight-shooting, hands-on leadership style.
This is Sage’s second executive shakeup in two years.
In 2007, Former Sage chief executive Ron Verni, who led the North American unit from Atlanta, and former chief financial officer Jim Eckstaedt were ousted by Sage’s British board.
Swenson, an industry outsider, was brought in to modernize the company’s sprawling operations, which are broken down into several large organizations all over the country.
Sage has seen sales slump as scores of small business customers have been hit with economic troubles.
For the 12 months through September, Sage’s North American division saw sales of $987 million, down 3% from the same period a year earlier.
It reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of $173 million, down 14% from a year earlier.
Boost Campaign Kickoff
Boost Mobile LLC, the pay-as-you-go wireless unit of Sprint Nextel Corp., hosted an open house at its offices near the Irvine Spectrum last week.
The event featured a live performance by the Boost Freestyle Motocross Team, including Derek Garland and X-Games medalists Jeff “Ox” Kargola and Jeremy Lusk.
The three demonstrated tricks such as the “kiss of death,” when the rider moves his head toward the front fender, as if to kiss it, while bringing his legs upward from the bike; the “Indian air,” when the rider moves his feet through the air as if he’s walking; and the “fender grab,” when the rider grabs the front or back fender with his hands.
Workers were treated to munchies from Santa Ana’s Wahoo’s Fish Taco, another homegrown company that got its start 20 years ago.
The open house kicked off of a new campaign for Boost.
The company launched a monthly unlimited program for the first time. It allows users an unlimited monthly plan for $50 within a geographic area, with no telecom taxes, roaming or long-distance fees.
It’s a departure from Boost’s typical prepaid service, where users pay for a set amount of calling time in advance. When the minutes are up, they buy more time. The plans usually include low-cost phones.
Boost has associated itself with extreme sports, hip-hop culture, edgy musicians, artists and comedians.
It has a very laidback, very SoCal style. Its offices have the feeling of a hipster loft,with exposed industrial ceilings and graffiti art on the walls.
Top Picks
Analysts at Lazard Capital Markets LLC have named two tech companies with local ties as their top stock picks for 2009.
They are Irvine’s Broadcom Corp. (surprised?) and Activision Blizzard Inc., which is based in Santa Monica and owns Irvine’s Blizzard Entertainment Inc.
The two were among 13 companies picked because they are “relative havens in the current environment with attractive upside potential in the long term,” analyst Paul Noglows said in a note to clients.
Lazard analyst Daniel Amir said Broadcom is “well-positioned for the downturn.”
“This semiconductor leader is one of the few companies that is gaining market share, has a strong balance sheet and has exposure to high-growth markets,” Amir said in a research note.
He was upbeat on Broadcom’s leadership and said the company is “conservatively managing its cash and operating expenses but is well-positioned to be one of the first companies to snap out of the downturn.”
Amir has a $20 per share target on the stock. Broadcom was trading at around $17 a share last week on a market value of about $9 billion.
Activision Blizzard, a unit of France’s Vivendi SA that’s publicly traded on the Nasdaq, was analyst Colin Sebastian’s winner for the entertainment sector.
“The shares are attractive based on industry-leading operating margins, a diverse online and offline revenue base and several of the strongest video game franchises,” he said.
Blizzard’s blockbuster online game “World of Warcraft” is a cash cow for its parent.
Sebastian cited “the recurring nature of high-margin online subscription revenues” from the game as a primary reason for why the company should thrive in 2009.
Some 11 million “World of Warcraft” subscribers pay $15 a month to face off with other players online.
