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One of the first big company CEOs to aggressively adopt social media, Sun Microsystems Inc.’s Jonathan Schwartz, turned to a social media platform when it was time to resign.
Schwartz, whose company was officially acquired by Oracle Corp. last week, posted his resignation on Twitter at about midnight east coast time Wednesday. Oracle’s acquisition of Sun was announced in April but was delayed by regulatory reviews in Europe.
“Today’s my last day at Sun. I’ll miss it. Seems only fitting to end on a #haiku. Financial crisis/Stalled too many customers/CEO no more. OpenJonathan Jonathan Schwartz.”
It was Schwartz who made the use of social media a core element in the customer relationship and product development efforts at California-based Sun, a company that has maintained a major presence in Massachusetts for two decades, with up to 1,700 local employees at one point. Sun was one of the first major technology companies to incorporate customer feedback features on its product-related webpages, encouraging both positive and negative feedback several years ago. At about the same time, Sun officials emphasized that Schwartz took the initiative to begin writing his own blogs while many other CEO blogs were being authored by public relations staffs.
Schwartz, 44, joined Sun in 1996 when Sun acquired his Lighthouse Design. Schwartz replaced former CEO Scott McNealey as CEO in 2006.
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