Qualcomm ‘hastily' promotes non-family president to CEO




Qualcomm “hastily” promoted its non-family president, Steve Mollenkopf, to CEO, and Paul Jacobs stepped back to become chairman,

the

Financial Times

reported.

Mollenkopf is Qualcomm’s first CEO outside the Jacobs family.

The company made the move because Mollenkopf, a 20-year Qualcomm veteran, was a top candidate to replace Steve Ballmer as Microsoft’s CEO, the

FT

article said.

Jacobs, the son of Qualcomm’s co-founder, told the

FT:

“This transition is part of a succession plan that we’ve been working on for a while.”

Jacobs also acknowledged in the

FT

interview:

“It’s a little bit accelerated relative to what we were originally planning…. Obviously we have very talented executives and our people are very sought-after. What we really wanted to do was ensure the continuity of the management team.”

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The

FT

report noted that since Paul Jacobs took over from his father in 2005, Qualcomm “has grown to become the world’s largest chipmaker by market capitalisation.” (Source:

Financial Times,

Dec. 13, 2013.)

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