Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Unica calls on ex-Cognos exec Shone for CFO

By Mass High Tech Staff

Unica Corp. reports that it has appointed Cognos Inc. executive Kevin Shone as senior vice president and CFO. Waltham-based Unica (Nasdaq: UNCA) provides enterprise marketing management software and services.

Shone, who will lead Unica’s global finance and administrative team, was recently vice president of global field finance and administration at software maker Cognos, which is now a division of IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM). At Cognos, Shone played a major role in supporting the company’s growth, as annual revenues increased from about $245 million to more than $1 billion, company officials said.

As the CFO for Cognos’ global field operations, he managed a team of more than 270 employees and led pre- and post-merger integration initiatives. Previously, Shone served as Cognos’ senior corporate counsel and then vice president of finance and administration for the company’s Americas operations.

Earlier this year, IBM acquired for $5 billion Cognos, a Canadian company that operates a U.S. headquarters in Burlington. The acquisition followed Cognos’ purchase of rival business intelligence software maker Westborough’s Applix Inc. for $339 million.

Cognos employs 4,000 workers; about 200 work in Burlington.

Unica, founded in 1992, develops software designed to streamline the marketing process from analysis and planning to project management, execution and measurement. The company, which employs about 500 workers, claims more than 600 customers.