Dr. James Truchard
President, CEO, and Cofounder
NI has announced its board of directors has elected Alex Davern to serve as chief executive officer (CEO) and president of National Instruments, effective Jan. 1, 2017.
Davern will succeed Dr. James Truchard, who has served as the CEO of NI since the company's founding in 1976.
Truchard will remain as chairman of the board. The board of directors plans to appoint Davern to the board by the end of January 2017. This transition is being undertaken as part of the board's succession planning process.
"It has always been my goal for NI to be a company built to last," said Truchard, CEO and co-founder. "Over the last decade, in the face of a weak industrial economy, I have focused my efforts on helping to ensure we were making the long-term strategic investments necessary to set NI up for future growth. I believe these major platform investments, in key areas like PXI modular instrumentation, RF measurements, CompactRIO, and our entire software platform, will continue providing NI with disruptive platform capabilities needed to expand our long-term market opportunity. Given our significant progress, much of which was showcased at NIWeek earlier this month, I believe NI is well-positioned for the coming decade."
Truchard continued: "It is the right time for me to retire as CEO. I have worked with Alex Davern for more than 20 years. He is an exceptional leader and business strategist, with a demonstrated track record of success. I have complete confidence in Alex and the rest of the senior leadership team at NI to continue delivering on our consistent track record of innovation, growth and profitability."
Alex Davern
In light of Davern's promotion, the company says it will start the process of considering candidates to serve as chief financial officer and expects to complete the process by the end of 2016.
"As a company built to last, Dr. Truchard has built an extremely capable senior leadership team over the years, and I am honored and excited to lead NI into its next phase of growth and profitability," said Davern. "Our differentiated platform and ecosystem coupled with our strong business model, give us the opportunity to be the preeminent company in test, measurement and control."
