Channel Boss Named CEO at Unify

**Editor’s Note: Click here to see which channel people were on the move in January.**

The acquirer of unified-communications provider Unify has picked a new CEO for the company.

Jon Pritchard is Unify’s new chief executive. He had been serving as executive vice president of channels.

France-based Atos Global said it was buying Unify – formerly Siemens Enterprise Communications – for $371 million last November. It completed the acquisition last month.

Pritchard joined Unify in 2014. Unify’s top brass say he increased the company’s focus on the channel during his tenure leading its partner program.

“We’re pretty much going to stop selling direct, selling in a partner-centric model, so we are making sure our programs are global and ready to support that,” he told Channel Partners in 2014.

Meanwhile, former CEO Dean Douglas has moved on to work with CenturyLink as its president of sales and marketing. CenturyLink announced that last week. {ad}

“I look forward to becoming part of the CenturyLink leadership team and being engaged in the incredible transformation under way at the company,” Douglas said.

Douglas took drastic steps at the helm of Unify after coming on board in 2013. He led the company in laying off half of its workforce, in an effort to “streamline the organization to focus on innovation in software development, integration and managed services.” The company said it was shifting away from hardware to become a “true communications and collaboration software and services company.”