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Zendesk Names Elena Gomez as Chief Financial Officer

Announcement posted by Bench PR 03 May 2016

Former Salesforce Executive Brings SaaS Expertise, Proven Management of Growth to Leadership Team

2 May 2016--Zendesk, Inc. (NYSE: ZEN) today announced the appointment of Elena Gomez, former senior vice president of finance and strategy at Salesforce, as its new chief financial officer. She replaces Alan Black, who served as Zendesk’s CFO since 2011 and earlier announced his plans to leave the company once his replacement was found.

 

“Elena represents a rare breed of finance leader who combines unparalleled knowledge of the SaaS business model with a proven ability to build teams and partner with business leaders,” said Mikkel Svane, Zendesk chairman, CEO and founder. “Her experience in managing growth across enterprise sales and multiple products will serve us well as we seek to become a $1 billion revenue company in 2020.”

 

During her five years at Salesforce, Gomez helped build a world-class finance operation. She most recently managed the finance and strategy organization supporting the company’s largest revenue-generating teams. Gomez brings proven experience in managing global growth and scaling finance operations for a multibillion dollar company to Zendesk as it broadens its enterprise reach and expands its product portfolio.

 

“Zendesk is an exceptional company that is transforming how companies build better customer relationships,” Gomez said. “I’ve admired the company from a distance and now am excited to join Mikkel and the leadership team in building its next phase of growth.”

 

Throughout her two-decade career in finance at Fortune 500 companies including Visa and Charles Schwab, Gomez has built a track record of strategic financial leadership and accomplishment.

 

Reporting to Svane, Gomez will lead Zendesk’s global finance and accounting team.

Gomez’s appointment as Chief Financial Officer will be effective immediately following the filing of the company’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2016, which is expected to be on or before May 6, 2016.

 

 

About Zendesk

Zendesk provides a customer service platform designed to bring organizations and their customers closer together. With more than 69,000 paid customer accounts, Zendesk’s products are used by organizations in 150 countries and territories to provide support in more than 40 languages. Founded in 2007 and headquartered in San Francisco, Zendesk has operations in the United States, Europe, Asia, Australia and South America. Learn more at www.zendesk.com.

 

Forward-Looking Statements

 

This press release contains forward-looking statements, including, among other things, statements regarding Zendesk’s future financial performance, its continued investment to grow its business, and progress towards its long-term financial objectives. The words such as “may,” “should,” “will,” “believe,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “target,” “project,” and similar phrases that denote future expectation or intent regarding Zendesk’s financial results, operations and other matters are intended to identify forward-looking statements. You should not rely upon forward-looking statements as predictions of future events.

 

The outcome of the events described in these forward-looking statements is subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause Zendesk’s actual results, performance, or achievements to differ materially, including (i) adverse changes in general economic or market conditions; (ii) Zendesk’s ability to adapt its customer service platform to changing market dynamics and customer preferences or achieve increased market acceptance of its platform; (iii) Zendesk’s expectation that the future growth rate of its revenues will decline, and that as its costs increase, Zendesk may not be able to generate sufficient revenues to achieve or sustain profitability; (iv) Zendesk’s limited operating history, which makes it difficult to evaluate its prospects and future operating results; (v) Zendesk’s ability to effectively manage its growth and organizational change; (vi) the market in which Zendesk operates is intensely competitive, and Zendesk may not compete effectively; (vii) the development of the market for software as a service business software applications; (viii) Zendesk’s ability to sell its live chat software as a standalone service and more fully integrate its live chat software with its customer service platform; (ix) Zendesk’s ability to sell its analytics software as a standalone service and to integrate its analytics software with its customer service platform; (x) breaches in Zendesk’s security measures or unauthorized access to its customers’ data; (xi) service interruptions or performance problems associated with Zendesk’s technology and infrastructure; (xii) real or perceived errors, failures, or bugs in its products; (xiii) Zendesk’s substantial reliance on its customers renewing their subscriptions and purchasing additional subscriptions; and (xiv) Zendesk’s ability to effectively expand its sales capabilities.

 

The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are also subject to additional risks, uncertainties, and factors, including those more fully described in Zendesk’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015.

 

Forward-looking statements represent Zendesk’s management’s beliefs and assumptions only as of the date such statements are made. Zendesk undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements made in this press release to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this press release or to reflect new information or the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as required by law.

 

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Source: Zendesk, Inc.