HID CEO Mysteriously Out

JH
John Honovich
May 23, 2015
IPVM

Typically, public corporation executive changes are handled smoothly (ok, not Avigilon).

But access control giant HID has mysteriously parted with their CEO. Their is no official announcement but the ex-CEO, Denis Hebert has updated his LinkedIn profile and HID has removed him from the management page. The most details available are from a PR person to a trade mag, declining to "comment on the reason for Hebert's departure and the replacement search process."

Assa all together has ~$6 billion annual revenue, and HID is in a division with Assa's hospitally unit that did ~$860 million annual revenue in 2014.

HID's organic sales were likely down in 2015. Their division was only up 1% organically but the hospitality unit they were in had strong growth. In addition, Assa said project orders were negative for HID in 2014, blaming "Demand from institutional customers in mature markets remains restrained in the light of ongoing budget restrictions"

The sloppy handling of this move either means that the ex-CEO either quit in a rush or was ousted. Either way, not a good sign for HID.

Anyone have any inside color of what motivated this?

U
Undisclosed #1
May 24, 2015
IPVMU Certified

The Assa Executive Team. HID CEO Denis Hebert, first red X from the left, is being replaced in the interim by Assa CTO Ulf Södergren, fourth from the left, next to an über confident Johan Molin, Assa CEO.

Maybe he couldn't keep up?

EN
EJ Nemec
Jun 01, 2015

We're a huge HID fan. They're able to produce custom orders for us accurately and on time. They're a role model that every company should strive to be like. As long as that doesn't change, I don't care who's running the show.

U
Undisclosed #1
Jun 22, 2015
IPVMU Certified

HID to name Stefan Widing as replacement to Denis Hebert.

Neither ASSA ABLOY nor HID Global has made an official announcement, but HID customers told Security Systems News that today they received an email announcement from Södergren alerting them of Widing’s appointment. Based in Sweden, Widing has been with ASSA ABLOY since 2006. For the past two years he has been GM of ASSA ABLOY’s Shared Technologies division, a division that reports to Södergren.

New discussion

Ask questions and get answers to your physical security questions from IPVM team members and fellow subscribers.

Newest discussions