eBay announced in a filing on Tuesday that its Chief Product Officer Pete Thompson is leaving the company next month. The news comes just 12 days after Thompson spoke to Wall Street analysts about the company’s vision for a “tech led reimagination” at eBay Investor Day on March 10, 2022.
In his presentation, Pete Thompson reviewed some of the projects he had worked on, included seller tools such as a unified listing tool and the ability to add video to listings.
Interestingly, Iannone told analysts in his presentation that over two-thirds of his leadership team was new to eBay or in a new role.
Thompson joined eBay in the fraught summer of 2019 when it was battling activist investors under the leadership of former eBay CEO Devin Wenig. Thompson came to eBay from Amazon, where he served as Vice President of Alexa Voice Service. In the July 2019 press release announcing his arrival at the company, eBay had written: “As eBay’s product experience leader, Thompson will be focused on simplifying an increasingly personalized and discovery-based shopping experience, while providing the enhanced tools and insights that help eBay sellers succeed.”
eBay has not publicly named a replacement for Thompson. Today’s eBay SEC filing is available on sec.gov.
Another RAT jumping off the stinking ship
another rat jumping from the sinking ship
Chief Product Officer? Ebay only offers one product, webspace, and they do that very poorly.
Things will not get any better for sellers, no matter what.
With the recent exodus of sellers, then buyers (15% 4th quarter 2021), it’s not entirely unexpected that those “responsible” (if that’s a word that can be applied to eBay any longer) for the downturn in eBay’s fortunes would be seeking greener pastures, as they likely realize that there is no turning a ship like eBay without the cooperation of “all hands on deck”.
And even if they get “all hands” to help, it’ll likely be turned the wrong way!