Pitney Bowes Inc. on Monday named former IBM executive Marc Lautenbach its CEO as Murray Martin, the mail and shipping equipment company’s chief executive, president and chairman, retired.
The Stamford, Conn., company said the switch takes place immediately. Martin also resigned from the board, and director Michael Roth was named non-executive chairman.
Lautenbach, who was also appointed to the company’s board, served most recently as managing partner of IBM’s North America Global Business Services. Pitney Bowes said Lautenbach spent 27 years at IBM.
Pitney Bowes’ revenue has been dropping as it struggles to adjust to the decline in U.S. mail brought by increasing reliance on email and private package deliveries, as well as the effect of the weak economy. Its shares had dropped 40 percent this year, in November hitting their lowest point in more than two decades.
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Shares rose 21 cents, or 1.9 percent, to $11.40 in morning trading Monday.
Pitney Bowes is shutting down a service that delivers mail and catalogues outside the U.S., and it is imposing other cost-cutting measures that will trim annual expenses by $45 million to $55 million.
The company kept its forecast for this year of earnings, excluding one-time items, of between $1.95 and $2.15 per share, on revenue of about $5.07 billion to $5.28 billion.
Analysts expect, on average, earnings of $2 per share on $5.01 billion in revenue, according to FactSet.