Stan Shih, the founder of Taiwan’s personal computer manufacturing company Acer, said this week that he plans to retire as the chairman next month.
The announcement came just six months after Shih returned to launch a series of reforms and restructuring.
The company confirmed earlier reports that Shih was scheduled to retire on June 18th, the same day as its shareholders meeting, during which his successor would also be elected. The 69-year-old made the somewhat surprising revelation during a gathering with reporters, the United Evening News claims.
Shih says that younger talent would be promoted to lead various divisions as the company shifts its business focus from hardware to cloud computing. It will be the company’s third major transformation since founding in 1976. Shih added that he expected Acer to “return to glory” three years from now.
November 2013 saw Shih replace former chairman and CEO JT Wang and the corporate president Jim Wong, who resigned after the company posted a net third-quarter loss of NT$13.1 billion ($442.2 million). A month after this in December, Shih relinquished his position of CEO and president to Jason Chen, a senior vice president of worldwide sales and marketing at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, the world’s leading contract microchip maker.
Senior executives have taken voluntary salary cuts of 30 percent since January this year, as the company continues to struggle financially against tough competition from Apple and other rivals.
Shih founded Acer in 1976 and built it into the world’s second largest PC maker in its heyday and one of the best known Taiwanese brands internationally.
