Sequoia’s software executive will run Workday as co-CEO
Eschenbach previously ran deals for Zoom and Snowflake
Carl Eschenbach, a seasoned software executive, joined Sequoia Capital in 2016 and later oversaw numerous profitable transactions for the venture capital firm. He is now resuming his operations role.
Up until 2024, Eschenbach will co-lead Workday as its new co-CEO alongside Aneel Bhusri, the business’ co-founder and chair, before taking over as its sole CEO.
Chano Fernandez, a former SAP executive who joined the company in 2014 and served as its co-CEO since 2020, has reportedly stepped down from both his roles as co-CEO and a member of the board of directors effective immediately.
Before joining Sequoia, Eschenbach had a long career working for many software companies, most significantly VMware for more than 14 years as president and COO before transitioning to venture capital. VMware is a leader in cloud computing and visualisation technology.
Sequoia owned 8.4% in Snowflake prior to the 2020 initial public offering. In many respects due to Eschenbach’s and Sequoia colleague’s Pat Grady it was the biggest software IPO ever.
As a result of Eschenbach’s efforts, Sequoia took part in the Series C and following rounds of fundraising. UiPath, which he later joined to board of, had a successful IPO last year, but its shares have suffered greatly from the market downturn.
Eschenbach also joined the Workday board of directors in 2018. The company periodically permits its partners to serve on other boards of directors when they are encouraged, even when it is not a Sequoia portfolio company.
The role of co-CEO is up for discussion, Safra Catz and Mark Hurd, two of Oracle’s senior executives, seemed to manage successfully up until Hurd’s passing last year. On the other side, SAP tried out a co-CEO position but then abandoned it.
Bret Taylor’s resignation came as a surprise, he wasn’t the only co-CEO of Salesforce to leave for a variety of reasons. Marc Benioff, a co-founder of Salesforce, appointed Keith Block co-CEO in 2018. Block worked in the position somewhat longer than Taylor.
