Clegg takes surprise sabbatical

Microsoft Canada president Frank Clegg suprised the industry with his decision to step down in January to take an extended vacation with family. However, he will return next September to assume an undertermined role within the company.

He told CDN that with one daughter about to enter university

and the other in high school it’s an ideal opportunity.

David Hemler, vice-president, central region, small- and mid-market solutions and partners, will become president.

During Clegg’s four-year reign Microsoft Canada grew 78 per cent in revenues and had been twice-named as subsidiary of the year in its region by its Redmond, Wash-based corporate parent. Microsoft Canada earns more than $1 billion in annual sales.

Clegg moulded Microsoft Canada “”during those strong years before the dot-com crash, but also continued to grow the business and move the business forward during the tougher years when there was an economic downturn,”” Chris Trauzzi, vice-president of marketing at Microsoft business partner Cyberplex Inc., said.

This effort in turn generated revenues for partners in the technology industry that could then “”service, support and build on top of”” Microsoft’s “”innovative software,”” he explained.

Trauzzi described Microsoft Canada as a huge supporter of Cyberplex, a Toronto-based technology consulting firm focusing on financial services.

“”He’s been given credit for bringing (in) the Bank of Montreal, a key account, and an account that we’ve had the opportunity to participate on,”” he said of Clegg.

Clegg has also been praised for his IT contributions to the community at large. He’s worked with Media Awareness Network and Bell Canada on a public education effort to help parents protect their children online.

He played a major part in assisting the Toronto Police Service to build the Child Exploitation Tracking System, a tool that better tracks and catches online predators and pedophiles. The system will be finished and given to law enforcement agencies before Clegg’s departure.

Yet, perhaps one of the outgoing president’s key public achievements relates to the Canadian National Institute for the Blind.

Three years ago, Clegg led a fundraiser for the CNIB’s “”That All May Read”” campaign, for which he received the Dr. Dayton M. Forman Memorial Award, recognizing outstanding leadership by individuals or organizations in the advancement of library and information services for Canadians who are blind or visually impaired.

Under this campaign, Microsoft Canada agreed to build a $33-million digital library for the blind, bringing together high-tech partners, providing content such as newspapers and magazines and offering $2.5 million in funding.

Moreover, Clegg’s team suggested, designed and financed a children’s discovery portal, providing a pathway into the CNIB library, online games like Battleship and a supervised chat room, Jim Sanders, president and CEO of the Toronto-based organization, said.

More than $23 million has been raised under the campaign team leadership of Clegg. “”It’s the biggest transformation of a library for the blind anywhere in the world,”” serving three million print-disabled Canadians, said Sanders.

Sanders said when Microsoft chairman Bill Gates visited Toronto two years ago one of his five stops was a CNIB gala dinner, where he promised to devote the rest of his career to making information more accessible to the blind, which would also become a Microsoft mandate.

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Jim Love, Chief Content Officer, IT World Canada

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