(Reuters) – Speaker maker Sonos said on Monday Patrick Spence will step down as its CEO after a disastrous app update last year sparked customer criticism and delayed the development and release of other products.
The company named board member Tom Conrad, 55, as interim CEO, effective immediately. Conrad is the outgoing chief executive of Zero Longevity Science, the maker of the metabolic health app Zero.
In May 2024, Sonos launched a new app that was plagued with significant issues, with users not able to perform essential functions like accessing or searching their music libraries, setting sleep timers, or even downloading the app.
The company said it would cost between $20 million and $30 million to fix these issues and decided to cut about 6% of its staff.
Spence, in October, had acknowledged mistakes surrounding the app’s release and said that he and seven other company leaders would forgo their bonuses.
Shares of the Santa Barbara, California-based company were down more than 8%. The stock has lost about 12% of its value in 2024.
In November, the company forecast a decline of about 9% to 22% in its first-quarter sales from a year earlier as it navigates market weakness and grapples with challenges from the app failure.
(Reporting by Jaspreet Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Tasim Zahid)
