Robin Abrams, president and chief executive officer of Verifone Inc., has reorganized her management team in a way that distributes the company's weight in both hardware and software directions.
The details of the new structure unfolded at Verifone headquarters in Santa Clara, Calif., over the four months since Ms. Abrams succeeded the forceful and charismatic payment-system visionary Hatim Tyabji, who was CEO since 1986.
With most of the organizational pieces in place, Verifone announced them to the outside world at the end of July, clearing up any mysteries about how Ms. Abrams would assert herself.
Her senior team mixes Verifone veterans and new people, emphasizes both point of sale systems and a futuristic electronic commerce strategy, and has someone with years of experience at Hewlett-Packard Co., which acquired Verifone last year and has allowed it to operate at arm's length.
"This is indicative of the kind of talent we have grown here over the years," Ms. Abrams, 47, said of her ability to draw from a "deep bench" that Mr. Tyabji left behind.
Two executives who led Verifone's advanced payment and electronic commerce thrust in recent years, Lloyd Mahaffey and George Hoyem, have both left for the venture capital industry. But their influence is still evident.
Thomas Kilcoyne, who previously headed the consumer systems division that Mr. Mahaffey created, was named general manager of the electronic commerce software division.
Mr. Kilcoyne has "an entrepreneur's mind, a blend of the visionary and operational, and he has marketing in his bones," Ms. Abrams said.
She also accorded division status to appliance systems, which is meant to build on the company's historical dominance at the point of sale as new merchant and consumer devices evolve. Pierre-Francois Catte, 41, was appointed general manager. He spent 17 years with Hewlett-Packard and most recently headed its Convex division.
"In maintaining our payment leadership role," Ms. Abrams said in an interview, "our view is that devices on the merchant countertop will look more and more like appliances. They will migrate from the countertop into the home and even into our pockets."
She said the divisions will have full profit-and-loss reporting status and are built to "speed time-to-market." What had been three software divisions have been streamlined.
Parallel to the divisions are a global engineering organization and a worldwide sales organization.
Engineering is led by chief technology officer Eugene Buechele, 52. He joined Verifone last year and previously worked for Intel Corp., 3Com Corp., and some Silicon Valley start-up companies.
Jan-Erik Rottinghuis, 51, is general manager of worldwide sales. Formerly of Polaroid Corp. and Bain & Co., Mr. Rottinghuis in the previous regime was head of the Europe, Middle East, and Africa region. Besides managing sales, he will "facilitate the migration of emerging technology" to all regions, Verifone said.
Mr. Rottinghuis is based in Paris, convenient for viewing smart cards and related advances. "He is an exceptional sales leader who understands the balance between our traditional businesses and the electronic commerce business," Ms. Abrams said.
Also reporting to her are Bill Barmeier, senior vice president overseeing operations and staff functions; Ken Wach, chief financial officer; and Paula Belikove, director of worldwide branding and marketing programs.
Ms. Abrams, who previously worked for Apple Computer Inc. and Unisys Corp., joined Verifone in 1997 as general manager for the Americas. She reports to William Russell, head of Hewlett-Packard's enterprise server group.
In a prepared statement, Ms. Abrams clearly indicated that the company intends to carry out Mr. Tyabji's visions: "We believe this (structure), along with our focus on customer requirements and ability to leverage Hewlett-Packard, positions Verifone to enable the convergence of the physical and virtual worlds of electronic commerce."
