Monday, August 7, 2006

3Com Appoints Edgar Masri as New CEO, Seeks Greater Stake in Huawei Joint Venture

3Com appointed Edgar Masri as its new President and CEO, replacing Scott Murray who submitted his resignation. Masri previously served as the Chief Operating Officer for Redline Communications. From 2000 to 2006, Masri was a general partner at Matrix Partners, a venture capital firm focusing on technology investments. Prior to joining Matrix, Masri spent 15 years at 3Com in a variety of senior management positions, including his role as Senior Vice President and General Manager of the company's former Network Systems Business Unit and President of 3Com Ventures.



3Com has also hired Bob Mao as Executive Vice President of Corporate Development to manage 3Com's interests in its China-based joint venture with Huawei Technologies, Huawei-3Com (H-3C). Mao currently is Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Pacific Telecommunications Council.



3Com also announced that it will begin negotiations with Huawei with the intent to increase 3Com's ownership stake in H-3C. 3Com currently owns 51 percent of H-3C and recently began consolidating H-3C's financial results. Under the terms of existing agreements, each party has the right, commencing on November 15, 2006, to initiate a bid process to purchase the equity interest in H-3C held by the other. These negotiations are intended to result in an agreement outside of the bid process.

http://www.3com.com

  • In January 2006, 3Com named R. Scott Murray President and Chief Executive Officer, replacing Bruce Claflin who retired. Murray also assumes Claflin's position on the 3Com Board of Directors. Murray will shortly become Chairman of the company's joint venture in China, Huawei-3Com. Prior to accepting the role of CEO for 3Com, Murray was the CEO of Modus Media International, a global provider of supply chain management and hosted services.