EMC: Gelsinger Heir to Tucci’s Throne

This article has been written by Ulrike Rieß, Fachjournalist, for speicherguide.de.

Gelsinger Heir to Tucci’s Throne
Heard it on the grapevine

               
Pat Gelsinger      Joe Tucci

Pat Gelsinger gets prepared to become the successor to Joe Tucci.

Tucci’s appearance at the EMC World 2011 displayed an elderly guy who seemed badly prepared and rather stumbling through his presentation. The Sicilian seems tired. He’s allowed to be. After a decade at the top rank of EMC and numerous strategically brilliant decisions one may as well show some weak spots although the most important event of the vendor is hardly the right place to do so. And so it happens that rumors get around: Behind the scenes Pat Gelsinger is warming up for taking over and may as well step onto the big EMC stage at the end of this year.

Las Vegas is always a good place for illustrious gossip and it also goes for storage giant EMC. After the keynote of Joe Tucci many attendees agreed that the usually happy go lucky east coast charmer has lost his radiance. Some speculated on health issues, others assumed that he is tired of glittering spectacle. This brought the focus – once more – back on Pat Gelsinger. Now he seems the most likely candidate to inherit the CEO position.

It wouldn’t be a bit surprising. Pat Gelsinger has got somewhat of a Steve Jobs of the enterprise IT. At Intel he was some sort of glamorous show star, young and with a remarkable carrier in which he climbed the job ladder as far as CFO, senior VP and GM of the Digital Enterprise Group. He represents an established business man who knows the strategically crucial elements of a company. Additionally to that he and his wife raise a role model family of four, he has written a book (The Juggling Act), he has earned an honorary doctor, and he got an audience with the Pope. What a guy. He seems ideal for the act as honorary, dedicated and efficient CEO, who cares about the wellbeing of the business as much as of the social environment.

When you look at the existing team of executives at EMC there is hardly anyone that can match their CV with Pat’s gleaming one. As done before, EMC would choose an (more or less) external person to fill in a high position rather than look for an aspirant within their own ranks. More than once the company showed that it prefers fresh blood when handing out high profile positions. It could as well be the right decision. To take over Tucci’s lead, who has made extremely good acquisitions and successful integrations over the last ten years, you have to be a similar type of leadership personality with visions for the company, a feeling for the market/business and last but not least an aura. All this – of course – only in fact that Tucci should resign from his post.

Prince Pat is patiently waiting for King Tucci’s abduction – just according to rumors, naturally. And we are waiting too; after all, we were there when the gossip happened.

Another addition, quite unusual for me: Steve Duplessie, analyst at ESG, published an essay on the topic of The Golden CEO and what identifies a person to be one; interesting and amusing. By the way, Joe Tucci is mentioned here and not Gelsinger, but surely that doesn’t mean anything at all.

Greetings from the grapevine,

Ulrike Rieß, Fachjournalist