Novell boss Frankenberg quits
The announcement was made this morning in a hastily convened US press conference where the firm named Frankenberg's replacement as president as insider Joe Marengi, formerly executive VP for worldwide sales at Novell. Marengi will report to former Hewlett-Packard CEO John Young, who joins as chairman, but Novell is still seeking a CEO.
Frankenberg joined Novell in April 1994, and immediately stamped his personality on the firm by selling off the WordPerfect applications group that former chief Ray Noorda had expensively acquired.
Frankenberg saw the new Novell stretching beyond the LAN to connecting other devices and at the heart if intra-net and groupware environments. However, a sequence of poor financial quarters and the increasing success of Windows NT in Novell's core business seems to have forced the popular ex-HP exec out.
Novell UK boss Tom Schuster will comment later today.