Product category:
Microprocessors, Microcontrollers and DSPs
News Release from: Zilog
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 14 March 2002
Thorburn and Burger move up at Zilog
Acting CEO Jim Thorburn has been elected to Zilog's Board of Directors as Chairman and CEO, and Executive Vice President Mike Burger has been named President.
Acting CEO Jim Thorburn has been elected to Zilog's Board of Directors as Chairman and appointed Chief Executive Officer In addition, Executive Vice President Mike Burger has been named President and elected to the Board of Directors
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 7 Dec 2001 at 8.00am (UK)
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Thorburn, 46, was brought into Zilog as Acting CEO in March 2001 to lead a restructuring of the company, which had seen a decline of its business due to the overall weakness in the semiconductor industry.
Since Q1 2001, Zilog has made significant financial improvement, turning a Q1 2001 EBITDA loss of $7 million into EBITDA gains of $6.6 million in each of Q3 and Q4 2001.
Under Thorburn's leadership, Zilog's management team is executing a restructuring plan that focuses the business on core products, rationalises manufacturing capacity, and reduces operating costs.
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"Jim's leadership and considerable semiconductor and financial experience are successfully leading Zilog through a transformational period.
As CEO and Chairman of the Board, Jim will leverage the company's strong brand and product expertise to expand its share of the over $5 billion embedded control market," said John Marren, a member of Zilog's Board of Directors.
Zilog recently launched an exchange offer that is expected to result in the conversion of all of its outstanding senior secured notes into equity.
After the conversion, expected to be completed before the end of Q2 2002 through a prepackaged Chapter 11 process, Zilog will be virtually debt-free.
"I am excited to be leading Zilog through its operational and financial restructuring," Thorburn said.
"Once we have eliminated our debt by restructuring our balance sheet, we can focus all our resources on supporting our customers with innovative, high value microcontroller, microprocessor and wireless semiconductor products." Thorburn brings more than 20 years of semiconductor industry experience with a background in strategy, finance, international operations, IPOs, leverages, buyouts, divestitures, and acquisitions.
Prior to joining Zilog, Thorburn was a consultant to the Texas Pacific Group, the current majority shareholder of Zilog.
He also served as Chief Operating Officer of ON Semiconductor from June 1999 to March 2001.
As COO of ON, Thorburn led the company's transformation from a Motorola division through a spinout and, ultimately, to a successful, independent, public company.
ON went public on NASDAQ in April 2000 and was the largest semiconductor buyout and IPO in Wall Street history.
Prior to ON Semiconductor and TPG, Thorburn's career spanned 17 years at National Semiconductor where he served as Vice President of Operations Finance.
He holds an honours degree in science and economics from the University of Glasgow, Scotland, and is a qualified, chartered accountant.
Mike Burger, 43, has been named President of Zilog and elected to Zilog's Board of Directors.
In his new role, Burger will be responsible for all product, engineering, marketing and sales activities at the company.
Prior to his current title, Burger held positions at Zilog as Executive Vice President, and Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Marketing.
"Mike has played a critical role in the turnaround at Zilog," Thorburn said.
"Mike's experience in the semiconductor industry and strong customer relationships will be essential as Zilog reinvigorates its core microcontroller and microprocessor businesses.
Burger has more than 20 years of semiconductor experience with a focus in sales and marketing of digital logic and analogue products.
Prior to his current appointment, Burger was Executive Vice President and General Manager responsible for the company's four Business Units, the Software Development group, the Tool Development group, and the entire selling organisation.
He joined Zilog in December 1998 as Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales.
Before joining Zilog, Burger was Vice President and Managing Director of National Semiconductor's Hong Kong-based Asia Division.
While at National, Burger created several Chinese joint ventures aimed at penetrating the Chinese Telecommunication marketplace.
In addition, he restructured the company's marketing approach from a product focus to an application focus, giving the company a better understanding of their customer systems and their applications.
As a result, he was responsible for propelling growth in the Taiwanese PC Market place through joint product development programmes with several leading Taiwanese PC manufacturers.
He also launched product development for the Asian customer base.
Burger holds a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from New Mexico State University.
He is a graduate of Stanford's Executive Management Programme.
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