Polycom Names Eric Brown as CFO and COO
Polycom, a standards-based unified communications (UC) company, has hired Eric Brown as chief financial officer (CFO), chief operating officer (COO) and executive vice president (EVP), effective 21 February 2012. In his dual roles as CFO and COO, reporting to Polycom president and chief executive officer (CEO) Andy Miller, Brown will manage all financial, operational, and IT functions at Polycom, which are being consolidated under one leader for greater efficiency and scale as the company looks to accelerate its momentum and grow faster than the overall UC market.
Polycom also announced that Mike Kourey will retire from his position as EVP and CFO of Polycom in order to pursue other opportunities, including spending more time on corporate boards and on various charitable activities.
Brown comes to Polycom from Electronic Arts (EA), a publisher of video game software, where as CFO and EVP, he led the company successfully through rapid change. Brown was instrumental in leveraging advances in wireless and mobile technologies, shifting EA to online distribution of products and services, and streamlining EA’s portfolio to drive profitability. He also served as key architect of a recent strategic acquisition designed to drive expansion and growth of digital offerings and make EA products available through mobile, social and cloud-based delivery.
Prior to EA, Brown was COO and CFO at McAfee. Before that, Brown was president and CFO of MicroStrategy, and also co-founded DataSage, where he also served as CFO. Brown earned his Bachelor’s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management.