VMware CFO Zane Rowe To Leave For Workday Job

Rowe, 52, had overseen VMware’s finance and accounting functions for seven years. He previously was CFO for EMC and United Airlines.

Zane Rowe

VMware CFO Zane Rowe will soon depart the company for a similar role at enterprise software vendor Workday.

The Palo Alto, Calif.-based virtualization all-star said Karen Dykstra, a VMware board member, was named as Rowe’s replacement effective June 9. Dykstra was previously the CFO of AOL from 2009 until September 2012.

Prior to her work for AOL, Dykstra worked as both CFO and chief operating officer of Plainfield Asset Management between 2006 and 2010. Additionally, Dykstra was CFO for ADP from 2003 to 2006.

Rowe is the latest high-profile executive to depart the virtualization giant. Shortly after Broadcom announced its intention to buy VMware, top channel leaders vice president of global sales Sandy Hogan and vice president and channel chief of the Americas Bill Swales left.

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Dykstra will get a monthly salary of $667,000 along with a one-time signing bonus of $800,000. Dykstra will not be eligible to participate in any of VMware’s executive benefit programs, including the executive bonus program, change-in-control retention plan or executive severance plan, VMware said.

Rowe resigned May 23, with an exit date of June 9. He plans to take a job at Pleasanton, Calif.-based Workday where he will “oversee the company’s overall finance and accounting functions, internal audit, and investor relations, and advise on Workday’s business strategy and product development.”

Workday’s current CFO, Barbara Larson, will step down to spend more time with her family, Workday said in an announcement.

Rowe, who is 52 years old, will receive an annual base salary of $700,000 and a one-time signing bonus of $2 million payable in two installments, according to his employment agreement with Workday. He will also be granted an equity award consisting of restricted stock units with a grant date value of $18 million with a vesting term of four years and an additional equity award consisting of restricted stock units with a grant date value of $18 million with a vesting term of two years.

Rowe oversaw VMware’s finance and accounting functions for seven years. He also worked as interim CEO of VMware from February 2021 to May 2021. Prior to his time at VMware, Rowe was named as CFO at EMC, CFO at United Airlines, and led North America sales for Apple.

VMware is in the midst of a $61 billion takeover by chip giant Broadcom.

VMware was hit with a cease and desist order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission last year to stop the company from pulling forward sales from one quarter to the next to give sales teams a jumpstart on the quarter. The practice amounted to misleading investors, the SEC stated.

“VMware misleadingly reassured investors on quarterly earnings calls and in earnings-related press releases and other earnings materials … that its revenue growth was meeting expectations, when revenue actually would not have met expectations or would have missed expectations by a larger amount without VMware’s continual net reductions in its discretionary backlog,” the SEC wrote Sept. 12, 2022.

Without admitting or denying the findings in the SEC’s order, VMware consented to a cease-and-desist order and was to pay a $8 million penalty.