HTC Reportedly in “Disarray,” Key Staff Members Take Pot Shots on Way Out the Door

Life at HTC is apparently worse than any of us initially suspected. After over a year of disappointing quarters, followed by manufacturing woes of their latest flagship, the One, the company is reportedly in “disarray.” A report out of The Verge last night paints a picture of a company who has lost key members of their leadership team, is starting to point fingers at the snap decisions of CEO Peter Chou for all mistakes, and whose Seattle U.S. headquarters are looked at as being in “utter freefall.” 

In the last few months, HTC has lost their Chief Product Officer, VP of global communications, retail marketing manager, director of digital marketing, and product strategy manager. Eric Lin, the product strategy manager, even took to Twitter this week to tell all of his “friends” who are still at HTC to “just quit” because they will “be so much happier.”

After the disastrous launch of the HTC First – the Facebook phone – followed by Chou’s forcing of the launch of the One, morale may be drained. Chou was reportedly warned of manufacturing issues of the One, but pushed the company to release it anyway. As you all know now, the One was plagued by delays at launch and with inventory issues because of those same manufacturing issues. Sources have said that sales of the device started off slow, but have since picked up as HTC has been able to produce it.

As far as their Seattle headquarters are concerned, sources told The Verge that people are avoiding the company just like they did of T-Mobile when the carrier was hemorrhaging customers a few years back. Sources have also said that new CMO Ben Ho could look to move some of the Seattle operations back to their Taipei headquarters.

Peter Chou has said that he will step down should the One fail, though this report tells a story of a company that may need a fresh start no matter how the One succeeds.

Via:  The Verge