I
n a letter to shareholders Overstock (NASDAQ:OSTK) founder and CEO Patrick Byrne announced a significant management shuffle of executives at both tZero and Overstock. The corporate change is described as intending to accelerate growth at tZero – overstock’s emerging initial coin offering platform for securities on blockchain. tZero is a majority owned by Overstock.
Byrne will now become President of Overstock. Ralph Daiuto will move over to President of SpeedRoute, while maintaining his role as General Counsel and COO of tZero. Saum Noursalehi becomes CEO of tZERO. Joe Cammarata is moving from his executive role with the firm to focus on his tZERO board role. Byrne, in relinquishing his CEO title of tZero, will become Executive Chairman of the blockchain platform. The announcement came in advance of Overstock’s forthcoming annual shareholder meeting.
Byrne said he was making “significant injection of human capital into tZero.”
“Saum Noursalehi, formerly president of Overstock.com (NASDAQ:OSTK), will assume the role of CEO of tZERO. Out of the thousands of executives I have worked with through the years, I’ve never met anyone who can manage innovation like Saum,” stated Byrne. “As a business-oriented technologist, his fingertip sense of the high costs of centralizing information and strong understanding of product teams and agile management makes him an extraordinarily effective executive. Saum’s proven track record as an innovative leader will help tZERO cement its market-leading position at the forefront of the emerging security token capital markets space.”
Byrne said he remains “no less committed to tZero” but the young company will benefit from Noursalehi’s skills.
“With this change and infusion of additional leadership into tZERO, I am confident we will have assembled the right team to take the company through its next phase.”
Ralph A. Daiuto, Jr., Esq. becomes president of SpeedRoute and related entities in addition to his roles of general counsel and COO of tZERO.
“I strongly believe Saum assuming an active leadership role in building tZERO, coupled with his building of a top technology team, will radically accelerate tZERO’s innovation cycle while representing a significant commitment in resources to the success of tZERO,” said Byrne.
As my own title and role change from CEO of Overstock to include President of Overstock Retail, I return to take over a wonderful retail executive team, which I am confident is the strongest in company history.
The Overstock earnings call is scheduled for Tuesday, May 8 followed by the annual shareholders meeting on May 9.
Overstock first quarter financial results for the period ended March 31, 2018 will take place on Tuesday, May 8, 2018 after the market closes. The conference call and webcast starts at 4:30 p.m. ET that day. To access the live webcast and presentation slides, go to http://investors.overstock.com. To listen to the conference call via telephone, dial (877) 673-5346 and enter conference ID 6077988 when prompted. Participants outside the U.S. or Canada who do not have Internet access should dial +1 (724) 498-4326 and enter the conference ID provided above.