A day after activist shareholder Ralph Whitworth targeted Sprint Nextel Corp.'s CEO Gary Forsee, the telecommunications company acknowledged it had "quietly" started a CEO search in August, and it expects to have a replacement by December, according to The Wall Street Journal. However, even before Friday's story, the newspaper's affiliated Deal Journal blog created a short list of contenders for Forsee's post.
NFL Networks’ Steven Bornstein, Western Wireless’s former CEO John Stanton and Verizon Communications president Denny Strigl are all Deal Journal's top candidates for the job. One name absent from the list is former MCI and Compaq Computer chief Michael Capellas — probably because he recently took the helm of First Data Corp.
However, if there ever was a person meant for the role, Capellas seems like a perfect fit. After all, he has not only overseen a telecom company, but he's overseen companies during a post-merger integration period and even a bankruptcy — not that Dealscape is suggesting Sprint Nextel is headed for Chapter 11. Unfortunately for Sprint Nextel, the odds of wooing Capellas from his new role are slim. Despite the credit crunch, the compensation rules of PE-owned companies still apply.
Perhaps then Capellas was the person the Journal said declined to be considered for the position. — Matthew Wurtzel
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See story from Deal Journal
See story about Whitworth from Dealscape
See story about First Data from TheDeal.com
See story about compensation from The Deal newsweekly
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