San Diego, CA, USA and Amaro, Italy — The IoT and M2M sector has seen two significant new appointments in recent days. In separate announcements, Novatel Wireless, Inc. (NASDAQ: NVTL) has appointed Michael Newman as executive vice president and chief financial officer. Meanwhile, in Italy Geoffrey Morton is now co-ordinating the worldwide sales of at Eurotech’s M2M/IoT offering.
Novatel Wireless, Inc. designs and develops M2M wireless solutions based on 2G, 3G and 4G technologies. As Jeremy Cowan reports, the company delivers Internet of Things (IoT) and Software as a Service (SaaS) to carriers, distributors, retailers, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and vertical markets worldwide.
“Mike Newman brings a wealth of executive, financial, legal and operational experience, including the unique skillset of having served as CFO and General Counsel at Websense, Inc., a San Diego-based publicly traded technology company,” said Alex Mashinsky, interim Chief Executive Officer of Novatel Wireless. “He’s the right executive at the right time for Novatel and we’re delighted to add him to our leadership team as we continue to execute our turnaround strategy.”
Prior to joining the company, Mr. Newman, 45, served in senior executive level positions at Websense, Inc. over an eleven-year span from 2002 to 2013. From 2011 to 2013, he served as Chief Financial Officer, and from 2002-2011 he served in a variety of capacities, including General Counsel and Chief Administrative Officer. While at Websense, Mr. Newman was responsible for a wide range of corporate functions including accounting, finance, legal, IT, sales operations and human resources. Mr. Newman co-led the company’s M&A activity, including the sale of Websense to a private-equity buyer in 2013. Prior to his time with Websense, Mr. Newman handled securities and corporate development matters in the legal department for Gateway, Inc., a publicly-traded computer manufacturer. Mr. Newman holds a JD from Harvard Law School and a B.S. in Business Administration from Georgetown University.
Tom Allen, who has served as Novatel’s Interim CFO since June 2014, will continue to provide consulting services to the company, including transition assistance to Mr. Newman in his new role.
Morton appointed new group VP for Eurotech’s M2M/IoT line of business
Amaro, Italy – Eurotech, a leading supplier of embedded systems, M2M platforms and IoT solutions, has announced the appointment of Geoffrey A. Morton as new group vice president for the M2M/IoT Line of Business. Under this role, Mr. Morton will co-ordinate the direct sales of Eurotech’s M2M offering worldwide, supervising and controlling the sales activities carried out by local teams in each subsidiary of the Group. Moreover, Mr. Morton will take the lead in the development of the indirect sales channels, such as VARs and System Integrators.
Geoffrey Morton has over 30 years’ experience in successfully developing business for both hardware and software solutions. During his last assignment before joining Eurotech, he has been leading the worldwide Java commercial business unit for Oracle as group vice president. His main responsibilities were defining the strategy, go to market and engagement models for the Java business; also to help define the strategy for development, execution and coordinate comprehensive industry campaigns and marketing plans encompassing integrated development, sales and marketing initiatives designed to penetrate and grow targeted markets in the Internet of Things (IoT).
“I’m very pleased that Geoffrey has joined Eurotech to boost the market penetration of our M2M & IoT offering”, said Roberto Siagri, President and Chief Executive Officer of Eurotech. “His extensive experience and proven abilities in successfully leading the business development of world-class HW and SW solutions will help us in getting traction on the market in terms of maximizing the number of customers and early adopters of our M2M platforms and IoT solutions.”