Symantec COO resigns with immediate effect

Former exec Gilliland returns to Symantec to lead enterprise division

Symantec COO and president Michael Fey has resigned with immediate effect.

Fey has been with Symantec since its acquisition of cybersecurity outfit Blue Coat Systems in 2016, where he held a similar role.

CEO Greg Clark - who also moved from Blue Coat as part of that acquisition - has taken over Fey's position as president.

Meanwhile, Art Gilliland, former CEO and president of hyperconverged specialist Skyport, is now EVP and GM of enterprise products at Symantec, while Marc Andrews remains in his role as VP of worldwide sales.

Gilliland headed up Skyport from 2015 until it was purchased by Cisco earlier this year.

He spent six years at Symantec overseeing its information security division from 2006 to 2012 after serving as general manager of enterprise security products at HP.

Clark welcomed Gilliland's return to the company.

"Art is a widely respected executive both inside and outside our organisation, and we are excited to welcome him back to Symantec," he said.

"We look forward to benefitting from his extensive enterprise security expertise and years of end-point and network experience in his new role.

"Additionally, I am very pleased to have Marc overseeing our enterprise security worldwide sales organisation to ensure seamless continuity.

"Marc's record of execution as a leader of enterprise security will continue to serve Symantec well."

Fey described on LinkedIn his departure from the security vendor as a "difficult day".

"Symantec is in a great place to embrace the future of cybersecurity and I am very grateful for the opportunity they extended to all of us when they purchased Blue Coat," he posted.

"While this was a difficult decision to leave this awesome team, I am very excited about the future."

The vendor claims that these leadership changes to its enterprise security division - which are effective immediately - "best positions" its business segment for the company's next phase of development.

Symantec has been struggling recently; it announced in August that it would cut eight per cent of its workforce due to tumbling enterprise sales, while also yielding to new investor Starboard Value which added three new board members to the firm.