America Online on Friday named Stephen Swad as its executive vice president and chief financial officer in its latest senior management shuffle as the ISP works to turn its fortunes around.
Swad was formerly executive vice president of finance and administration for AOL Time Warner’s Turner Broadcasting System. In his new role as CFO for AOL, Swad will report to
AOL Vice Chairman Joseph Ripp, who had filled the financial oversight role before being named vice chairman in September.
In his new position, Swad is expected oversee financial planning, analysis and reporting as well as tax planning and compliance for the ISP, which is weathering the end of a sharp drop in advertising and commerce revenues wrought by the end of the tech bubble.
Prior to working for Turner, Swad served as vice president of financial planning and analysis for AOL Time Warner and helped manage the company’s budgetary and analysis process. Before joining the then-Time Warner in 1998, Swad had been a partner at KPMG, and a deputy chief accountant with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission.
In a statement, the 41-year-old Swad said: “I’m excited about the opportunity to work with Joe Ripp and the rest of the team at America Online. 2003 is a key year for AOL and I look forward to being part of the effort to revitalize the business.”
Swad comes to the post at the world’s largest ISP just weeks after shakeups in senior management at the ISP, and at its parent company. In January, AOL founder Steve Case said he would resign from his role as chairman of the parent company in May. AOL Time Warner CEO Richard Parsons is slated to take on the chairman role. Ted Turner, the legendary founder of AOL Time Warner’s cable news channel CNN, also announced he would depart the company.
AOL has laid out a plan to turn around its finances after a two year slide and put regulatory probes into accounting behind it, which has included a spate of executive changes. The company recently brought in former Charles Schwab executive Leonard Short to head up branding efforts at AOL.
Among its programming ranks, AOL also recently brought in two media veterans to work on children- and community-focused programming. Malcolm Bird, a former executive with children’s channel Nickelodeon UK, was recently named senior vice president and general manager of its AOL Kids Only division. And Tina Sharkey, one of the founders of women’s focused portal iVillage joined in January as senior vice president of lifestyle and community programming.
