MobileMedia Corp. apparently has outgrown the talents of its leaders.
Six months after the company purchased MobileComm from BellSouth Corp., MobileMedia Chief Executive Officer Gregory Rorke, President and Chief Operating Officer John Kealey and Senior Vice President of Operations Rodolfo Ploder are leaving the company. The board of directors felt that “given the dramatic changes in the size and scope of the company, different skill sets and different management strengths were needed,” stated MobileMedia spokeswoman Laura Wilker of Burson-Marsteller, New York.
She said the board of directors and three executives came to an agreement about their resignations.
Rorke will stay aboard as a company director and provide consulting during the transition to a new CEO. Kealey’s and Ploder’s resignations will be effective Sept. 15, said MobileMedia. The Ridgefield Park, N.J.-based company hopes to fill the CEO and COO positions as soon as possible, Wilker said.
David Bayer, a MobileMedia board member, was named chairman of the board and acting CEO. Stephen Burdette, MobileMedia’s vice president of corporate development, was named acting vice president of operations. F. Warren Hellman, a general partner of Hellman & Friedman-an affiliate of MobileMedia’s largest stockholder-joined MobileMedia’s board of directors, increasing his firm’s board representation to four of seven total members.
MobileMedia would not comment on specific reasons for the executives’ departure. In response to questions about the shakeup, Director of Marketing Services Anne-Marie Drozd said she knew no more about the change than what was written in MobileMedia’s press release, drafted by Burson-Marsteller.
Rorke joined MobileMedia in October 1994, Ploder in December 1993 and Kealey in 1987 as vice president/ chief financial officer. He became president in July 1992.
On behalf of the board of directors, Hellman said in a prepared statement, “Our highest priority is to effectively integrate the recent acquisition of MobileComm and help us to continue to capitalize on the growth of the wireless messaging industry.”
Bayer is an investor in and board member of Western Wireless Corp. and founded CyberTel Corp., a paging and cellular provider. Burdette was vice president of marketing for MobileComm before joining MobileMedia in 1994. In 1984, Burdette started Bell Atlantic Corp.’s paging business and served as president, said MobileMedia.
Due to management changes, MobileMedia said the planned private placement of debt securities has been deferred.
MobileMedia is the nation’s second largest paging company with about 4.3 million subscribers. For about $930 million, MobileMedia acquired MobileComm, including its nationwide narrowband personal communications services license, in January. The combined companies’ products and services are marketed under the MobileComm brand name. MobileMedia’s 1995 revenues exceeded $560 million, said the company. Second quarter financial results are scheduled for public release today.
