EBay CEO Devin Wenig Steps Down; Company Seeks To Sell Assets
SAN JOSE (CBS SF/CNN) -- Silicon Valley online retailer eBay announced Wednesday that CEO Devin Wenig was stepping down and the company was attempting to sell off or spin off some of its assets including ticket reseller StubHub.
Scott Schenkel, a longtime eBay executive, will take over as interim CEO while the board conducts a search for a permanent replacement.
"Devin has been a tireless advocate for driving improvement in the business, particularly in leading the Company forward after the PayPal spinoff," Thomas Tierney, chairman of the board at eBay, said in a statement. "Indeed, eBay is stronger today than it was four years ago."
In a tweet, Wenig said, "In the past few weeks it became clear that I was not on the same page as my new Board. Whenever that happens, its best for everyone to turn that page over. It has been an incredible privilege to lead one of the worlds great businesses for the past 8 years."
But the executive shuffle also comes at a key moment for the company. Earlier this year eBay initiated a strategic review of its assets, including ticket sales site StubHub and the Classifieds Group, after facing pressure from activist investors to spin off or sell these properties.
In the announcement Wednesday, eBay said this strategic review is ongoing.
The company also previously added two directors to its board, including Jesse Cohn of Elliott Management, an activist hedge fund that disclosed a 4% stake in the company in January and began agitating for change. Elliott Management also recently took a large stake in AT&T, whose media division, WarnerMedia, is the parent company of CNN.
This year, eBay also announced a restructuring that would bring various regional marketplace units under one global leadership team.
Even if these moves do appease investors, analysts have questioned the extent to which eBay can turn around its business, which faces a years-long decline in relevance and prestige in the face of competition from Amazon and others.
