Founder Steps Down Wave: CEOs Hand Off Power but Keep Board Seats

A season of handoffs

Over the past several weeks, a large number of companies have announced the same kind of leadership change. A founder or long-serving chief executive leaves day-to-day management, a successor takes the CEO title, and the departing leader moves to the board as chair, executive chair, adviser or non-executive director. The companies range from a trillion-dollar device maker and a six-decade-old conglomerate to a beverage-alcohol marketplace, an Indian gaming company and a Brazilian pop-culture convention business. Taken together, they show that the founder exit is now usually a staged change of role, not a clean break. They also show that the staging can fail.

The most consequential case is Apple. John Ternus, who previously ran hardware, became CEO on September 1, and Tim Cook moved to executive chairman after 15 years in the top job.4 Cook did not found Apple, but his handoff follows the same pattern. One account says he timed it so Ternus would lead the iPhone Duo launch eight days later instead of making it his own farewell.2 Cook now works on government relations, global policy and regulatory issues, and he has said he is "not meddling" in Ternus's business.42

Berkshire Hathaway completed a similar sequence. Warren Buffett stepped down as chairman to become chairman emeritus and kept his board seat. The board elected his son Howard, a director since 1993, as chair, and Greg Abel continues as CEO.13 Buffett had already given up the CEO role on December 31.13 One headline-adjacent caption described him as leaving both posts in September, but the body of the same coverage makes clear that Abel had replaced him as CEO earlier in the year.20

The founder-to-chair template

Below the mega-caps, the pattern is the same. At Provi, a B2B marketplace for the beverage alcohol trade, founder Taylor Katzman is giving the CEO job to Matthew Tucker, a former Olo president and former head of Tock, and becoming executive chairman.11 The company presents the change as continuity. Katzman stays involved, while an investor at Bessemer Venture Partners describes Tucker as the person to lead the "next phase" of growth.11

The Omelete Company, which runs Brazil's CCXP convention, named Diego Dias CEO in place of co-founder Pierre Mantovani. Mantovani will chair the board with fellow co-founder Renato Fabri.17 Mantovani said the move had been discussed for two years. It is part of the company's largest management overhaul in its 26-year history, including combining Omelete and CCXP into one operating structure.17

At eXp's parent company, now called AGNT Inc., founder Glenn Sanford announced that he will step down as CEO and hand the job to Leo Pareja, who already runs the brokerage. Sanford stays on as board chair.1 It is the second time Sanford has passed leadership to Pareja: Pareja took the brokerage CEO role in April 2024 while Sanford kept the parent-company job.1 The change also follows the company's contested move to reincorporate in Texas, which New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli had urged shareholders to reject.1

Family-controlled companies are adapting the same approach. Italian mountain-footwear maker La Sportiva named Roberto Fortunato CEO in place of Marcello Favagrossa and added outside senior figures to a board that is still led by President Lorenzo Delladio and includes fourth-generation family members.18 The family keeps ownership and adds professional management around it.18

Nazara: a two-step exit, read two ways

Nazara Technologies shows how the template can be applied in stages and how differently the same move can be described. Founder Nitish Mittersain gave up the CEO title in August, and Bluetile Games founder Raymond A. Stauffer became chief executive on September 1.3 At an October 12 board meeting, Mittersain was redesignated from managing director to founder and non-executive director, subject to shareholder approval.8 The same meeting made CaratLane founder Mithun Sacheti an executive director, appointed Arun Agrawal as CFO to replace the departing Rakesh Shah, and approved a preferential share allotment of about Rs 730.78 crore.810

The coverage diverges on the reason. One report follows the company's account that the change lets a professional team lead the next phase while Mittersain advises the board on strategy.3 Another links his August exit as CEO directly to first-quarter FY27 results that were hurt by losses from associates and impairment charges.10 The second reading is more useful. In this analysis, a founder stepping back right after a weak quarter, together with a CFO change and new capital, looks more like a reset of governance than a calm generational handoff. The company's language is mostly about timing.

When the template breaks: Better.com

The orderly cases matter more when set against Better.com, where the founder-to-board arrangement became a fight over control. Founder Vishal Garg stepped down as CEO on August 3, about a week after investor Daniel Lewis joined the board. The board named Lewis interim CEO.12 Garg kept his board seat and is now asking shareholders to remove five of the eight directors, including Lewis and chairman Harit Talwar, with a contest deadline of October 20.12

Both sides have argued in public through SEC filings, posts on X and press releases. Garg says he was coerced into leaving, and Lewis has called him a "bully."12 The detail most relevant to this broader trend is that, according to the reporting, the board first told shareholders the handoff was amicable and orderly, then reversed weeks later and said Garg was unfit to lead.12 In mid-August the company issued a statement calling his leadership destructive and citing more than $1.5 billion in GAAP net losses since 2022.12

The proxy advisers are split. ISS and Glass Lewis support the current board, citing value lost under Garg, while Egan-Jones backs Garg's slate.12 Even the outcome is complicated: director Hugh Frater has said he will resign if Garg returns in any executive capacity.12

Better.com shows the main risk of keeping a departing founder on the board. A board seat keeps a founder's knowledge and relationships available, but it also gives them a base for a challenge if they disagree with the successor or feel pushed out. Cook's public promise not to meddle reads like a deliberate answer to that risk.2

Acquirers, interim chiefs and crisis appointments

Not every transition involves a board seat. After Church & Dwight bought Touchland in a deal valued at up to $880 million, founder Andrea Lisbona stepped down as CEO. She is now a founder and strategic adviser on brand, innovation and retail.5 Church & Dwight is recruiting a general manager who will report to a division president. That means the brand will be run as a unit inside a larger company, not by a standalone chief executive.5 Coverage notes that Lisbona's $50 million in restricted stock compensation rights depends on continued employment, and it is unclear how the change affects that.5 The company did something similar after buying Hero, whose co-founder moved into an adviser role after the deal.5

Other changes were abrupt. Vantiva's board said CEO Tim O'Loughlin had resigned as chief executive and director for personal reasons, effective immediately. CFO Lars Ihlen, who has served as interim CEO before, will hold both roles while the board looks for a permanent CEO.9 The Nashville Symphony's board replaced president and CEO Mark Cantrell, who had held the job only since August, with former director Mark Tillinger. The change came less than a day after the orchestra suspended its season and furloughed all 77 musicians.1516 Cantrell had said the institution had "exhausted its cash" after years of depending on one donor, the late Martha Ingram.16

What it adds up to

The main takeaway is that the clean founder exit has become rare. In most of these cases, boards are separating operating control from symbolic and strategic influence. The CEO title goes to a professional manager or an internal successor, and the founder keeps a chair, an advisory title or a board seat. Investors appear to accept this when the business is doing well and the founder's continued role has clear limits. Berkshire's change, for example, drew praise from one investor as good governance even though the stock has trailed the S&P 500 this year.20

The arrangement is weakest when the change follows poor results or a falling-out instead of a long-planned succession. Nazara's timing and Better.com's public dispute both fall on that side. Founders, boards and investors should watch the Better.com shareholder vote on October 20. It will test whether a founder who still holds a board seat can take back control from the board that removed him as CEO.