Sonos CEO Patrick Spence Resigns After App Redesign Debacle

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence stepped down from the top job and his seat on the board on Monday (Jan. 13) after the speaker company faced months of challenges and laid off 6% of its workforce following a fraught redesign of its mobile app.

According to a press release, Sonos’ board of directors named Tom Conrad, an independent member of the board since 2017, to be the company’s interim CEO/president. Spence will stay on as a strategic advisor overseeing the handover of CEO responsibilities until June 30.

Spence, who joined Sonos in 2012 and was named CEO in 2017, oversaw the launch of the company’s redesigned app last May, which frustrated customers who said the app didn’t recognize existing Sonos speakers and made it difficult to link new speakers. The complaints forced the company to lower holiday sales projections and delay product launches, with fixes projected to cost between $20 million and $30 million.

Conrad, 55, is a veteran of tech companies Snap Inc, Quibi and the streaming music company Pandora Media. He’s tasked with improving Sonos customers’ experience and the company’s financial performance, duties to which he is “uniquely suited,” Sonos board director Julius Genachowski said in a statement.

Conrad spent a decade at Pandora as chief technology officer/executive vp of product between 2004 and 2014. During that time, he led one of the earliest initiatives to integrate Pandora and Sonos. “I got my first glimpse of the magic that Sonos could bring to millions of lives every day,” he said in a statement. I am excited to work with our team to restore the reliability and user experience that have defined Sonos, while bringing innovative new products to market.”

In a statement, Genachowski thanked Spence for building “on our pioneering success in wireless home audio and … [leading the company] into premium audio for home theater, portables, and headphones.”