Uber president Jeff Jones quits, deepening turmoil
Uber president Jeff Jones quits, deepening turmoil
By Heather Somerville | SAN FRANCISCO Mon Mar 20, 2017 |
2:12am EDT
Ride services company Uber Technologies Inc has been
thrust deeper into turmoil with the departure of company president Jeff Jones,
a marketing expert hired to help soften its often abrasive image.
Jones quit less than seven months after joining the San
Francisco company, an Uber spokesman said on Sunday.
In a statement to Reuters, Jones said he could not
continue as president of a business with which he was incompatible.
"I joined Uber because of its mission, and the
challenge to build global capabilities that would help the company mature and
thrive long term," Jones said.
"It is now clear, however, that the beliefs and
approach to leadership that have guided my career are inconsistent with what I
saw and experienced at Uber, and I can no longer continue as president of the
ride sharing business," he added. Jones wished the "thousands of
amazing people at the company" well.
Jones' role was put into question after Uber earlier this
month launched a search for a chief operating officer to help run the company
alongside Chief Executive Travis Kalanick.
Jones had been performing some of those COO
responsibilities. He joined Uber from Target Corp, where he was chief marketing
officer and is credited with modernizing the retailer's brand.
"We want to thank Jeff for his six months at the
company and wish him all the best," an Uber spokesman said in an emailed
statement.
Uber's vice president of maps and business platform,
Brian McClendon, said separately he plans to leave the company at the end of
the month to explore politics.
"I'll be staying on as an adviser," McClendon
said in a statement to Reuters. "This fall's election and the current
fiscal crisis in Kansas is driving me to more fully participate in our
democracy."
Jones and McClendon are the latest in a string of
high-level executives to leave the company.
Last month, engineering executive Amit Singhal was asked
to resign due to a sexual harassment allegation stemming from his previous job
at Alphabet Inc's Google. Earlier this month, Ed Baker, Uber's vice president
of product and growth, and Charlie Miller, Uber's famed security researcher,
departed.
Technology news site Recode first reported Jones'
departure on Sunday.
Uber, while it has long had a reputation as an aggressive
and unapologetic startup, has been battered with multiple controversies over
the last several weeks that have put Kalanick's leadership capabilities and the
company's future into question.
A former Uber employee last month published a blog post
describing a workplace where sexual harassment was common and went unpunished.
The blog post prompted an internal investigation that is being led by former
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.
Then, Bloomberg released a video that showed Kalanick
berating an Uber driver who had complained about cuts to rates paid to drivers,
resulting in Kalanick making a public apology.
And earlier this month Uber confirmed it had used a
secret technology program dubbed "Greyball," which effectively
changes the app view for specific riders, to evade authorities in cities where
the service has been banned. Uber has since prohibited the use of Greyball to
target local regulators.
Uber is also facing a lawsuit from Alphabet Inc's
self-driving car division that accuses it of stealing designs for autonomous
car technology known as Lidar. Uber has said the claims are false.
Jones joined Uber in August and was widely expected to be
Kalanick's No. 2. Jones was tasked with overseeing the bulk of Uber's global
operations, including leading the ride-hailing program, running local Uber
services in every city, marketing and customer service, and working with
drivers.
The Independent Drivers Guild, an organization that
advocates for Uber drivers, on Sunday was critical that Jones "has left
the company without making a single improvement to help drivers struggling to
make a living," said Ryan Price, executive director of the guild.
(Reporting by Heather Somerville in San Francisco and
Subrat Patnaik in Bengaluru, Editing by Alistair Bell, Himani Sarkar and
Gopakumar Warrier)
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