AOL’s Europe CEO Dana Dunne is the latest to be hit by AOL’s new broom – he’s leaving the company after a European reorg, NMA says and a spokesperson confirmed to us: “Earlier this year, the AOL (NYSE: TWX) leadership made a decision to make some changes to the organisation in Europe – as part of that process, the position that Dana led changed considerably and, as a result, he’s leaving the company.
“Tim Armstrong is in the midst of a 100-day process – he’s doing the deep dives on all aspects of the business, listening to employees around the world – he’s met over half of AOL’s employees, he’s been to Europe twice. While Tim is making progress, we haven’t yet announced that strategy so, in the interim and until we finish that 100-day process, Ariel Eckstein will step in and manage the area.”
The company could not tell us what those org changes were or whether they came before Armstrong’s appointment as CEO in March or during the 100-day review, but said: “It wasn’t a Tim decision.” We never did get detail on how AOL Europe enacted the mothership’s January decision to cut 10 percent of global staff. There aren’t thought to be any other personnel changes at this time except Dunne and Eckstein, who had been VP of business expansion for Europe.
Dunne joined in 2007. It was he who, after a sale pitch from Bebo, played go-between to Bebo president Joanna Shields and then AOL COO Ron Grant. Under, Armstrong, Grant has gone, Shields has left the People Networks that is fading in to the background and ex-Googler Jeff Levick having replaced Greg Coleman as Platform-A president.