The board of directors of daily deals site Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ: GRPN) is expected to hold a meeting on Thursday and discuss whether the company should looking out for a new CEO.
Although the board meeting is believed to be a regular event, the discussion on whether the company needs a new CEO comes at a time when more-and more cracks are emerging among board members with regard to Andrew Mason’s performance.
Mason, who is 32 years old, was appointed as the Chief Executive of Groupon as the board believed that youthful exuberance along with his humor will yield positive results for a young startup.
Nevertheless, slowing growth rate following Groupon’s initial public offering in last November, started to raise question mark over Mason’s leadership qualities. Critics argued whether Mason was capable enough to be in-charge of multi-billion dollar public company.
Apparently, Eric Lefkofsky and some other board members have become ever more infuriated over the Chicago-based Company’s drubbing in the stock market and have tried to push Mason to become more vociferous in defending the business.
Although Lefkofsky, 42 years old, have been an early mentor to Mason, both of them time after time clashed in the past, say sources familiar with the situation to the Wall Street Journal.
Ever since the Company went public, it had to endure many obstacles. To begin with company’s accounting methods were questioned by regulators, then it received more jolt after several of top level executives departed from the company. While this was on, flagging sales, especially in the Europe severely dented investors’ faith on the company.
Just few days ago, Groupon posted a loss of $2.98 million in the fiscal third quarter, citing falling revenue growth and fragility in European markets. Lately, in order to offset in weakness in its core business, Groupon has been trying to reinvent itself. For Instance, it introduced new products such as software (Breadcrumb, a point-of-sale iPad application) for hospitality industry and electronic payment systems (Groupon Payments) for local businesses.
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