IBM Layoff Fallout: Softlayer Boss Crosby Quits

Obscured, perhaps in the uproar surrounding IBM’s (IBM) latest round of layoffs and a rumored full-scale corporate reorganization, was an employee post on the Alliance@IBM forum saying Lance Crosby, Softlayer founder and chief executive and general manager of IBM’s cloud business, had resigned.

In the immediate wake of the high-pitched layoff chatter this past Monday, the message appeared lost and not many (except for The VAR Guy) paid it much attention. Too bad, because as it turns out, the IBM employee’s post was accurate. Indeed, many observers believed Crosby’s exit to be only a matter of time, given that IBM had passed him over in favor of 34-year company veteran Robert LeBlanc to head its cloud business unit.

Crosby, whose cloud service company IBM bought in 2013 for some $2 billion and turned it into the foundation of its cloud business, will depart the vendor at the end of this week after about a year and a half on the job.

Both Crosby and IBM confirmed his imminent exit.

“I am very proud of the business we built and the team who continue to evolve SoftLayer at IBM,” Crosby said. “Now that the business is successfully integrated into IBM, I am ready to take some time off before I pursue my next challenge.”

IBM pretty much said the same thing: “We wish Lance Crosby the best as he takes a well-deserved break before pursuing new endeavors. Lance has left his mark on IBM. SoftLayer has become an important part of IBM’s cloud portfolio, and has played a big role in our success.”

Cloud is among a quartet of strategic businesses, including business analytics, mobile and security, that IBM intends to mine to shepherd the company’s transition away from old line hardware and software to a new business model. In 2014 financial results just reported, IBM said its cloud revenue grew 60 percent for the year to $7 billion, about half of which was cloud services business generated by Softlayer.