Mozilla, the US-based developer of the Firefox web browser, has appointed Chris Beard, most recently an executive-in-residence for venture capital firm Greylock Partners, as its interim chief executive.
Beard will replace Brendan Eich, who was promoted to CEO last month only to resign 10 days later after vehement online protests regarding his donation in 2008 to a campaign against Proposition 18, which would have legalised gay marriage in California.
Given his venture capital experience, the presence of Beard, who was previously chief marketing officer at Mozilla from 2004 until July 2013 when he left to join Greylock, as Mozilla’s CEO could potentially lead to it taking a more active role in corporate venturing.
The company is owned by the Mozilla Foundation, which operates as a non-profit organisation dedicated to supporting Mozilla as an open source product, and turnover could potentially be redistributed into investments in startups or acquisitions, particularly if they deal with open source software.
Mozilla chairwoman Mitchell Baker said in a blog post announcing Beard’s appointment: “He’s been actively involved with Mozilla since before we shipped Firefox 1.0, he’s guided and directed many of our innovative projects, and his vision and sense of Mozilla is equal to anyone’s.”
Mozilla invested in mobile app platform Everything.me and open source online video company Amara in 2012 but has since been quiet on the venture capital front.