Umbraco appoints Mats Persson as new CEO amid rapid growth
Umbraco, the open-source web content management platform provider, has appointed Mats Persson as its new Chief Executive Officer. This leadership change follows a period of significant growth, which includes three recent acquisitions and a rapid increase in the adoption of Umbraco Cloud services.
Kim Sneum-Madsen, who has been in the CEO role since 2019 and will remain on the company's board of directors, oversaw this growth. During his tenure, Sneum-Madsen expanded the company from 56 employees to significantly more, invested in developing Umbraco Cloud and regional hosting services, and orchestrated several acquisitions to enhance the product offering. His efforts have positioned Umbraco among the top three web content management systems in the UK public sector. The platform is notably used by enterprises such as Carlsberg Group, UK Power Networks, and the Council of the European Union.
Martin Henricson, Chairman of the Board at Umbraco and Managing Director at Monterro, which acquired a majority stake in Umbraco in 2021, commented on the transition. "Umbraco has achieved consistent, strong growth over the past two years, and Kim believes that now is the right time to hand over the baton. We are delighted to welcome Mats Persson as our new CEO. I'm confident that Mats’ extensive international experience and leadership will be invaluable as he, along with Umbraco’s staff, community, and partners, builds on Umbraco’s world-class solutions and continues its international expansion. We thank our outgoing CEO, Kim, for his outstanding work and achievements thus far for Umbraco and welcome him to the Board of Directors," Henricson said.
With three decades of leadership experience, including roles at PWC, IBM, Adform, and Cavai, Mats Persson brings a wealth of knowledge to Umbraco. He holds a Master’s degree in computer science and a Bachelor’s degree in economics. "This is a really exciting time to be joining the company," Persson stated. "Umbraco has steadily grown to 150 people, with its international presence reinforced by a well-established partner network and a global community of highly-engaged open-source software contributors. Over the past thirty years of working in this industry, I’ve seen that once a company reaches this size, that’s when it really gains momentum in the market."
Persson emphasised the growing adoption of open-source software within enterprises and the public sector as a significant growth opportunity for Umbraco. "I’ve spent decades working with proprietary software enterprises and start-ups, so I am looking forward to applying my experience within an open-source CMS company that allows digital organisations the freedom to build exactly what they need. Umbraco is also a truly international company and that’s where I bring particular value, having worked in the UK, US, and Nordics," he added.
He also noted that his leadership style aligns well with Umbraco’s company culture. "Umbraco is branded as the friendly CMS. Those core values of making things easy for users, and taking care of its partners, open-source community, and people, are demonstrated at every level of the organisation," Persson observed.
Persson highlighted the power of the open-source community and the digital agency partner network to extend Umbraco’s footprint and deliver local support to international organisations. "Umbraco already has partners and customers throughout the EU, UK, US, Australia and New Zealand, India, Vietnam, and Nepal, and I’m looking forward to helping the company to build on that global presence. The open-source CMS platform is also highly flexible and scalable, giving customers the freedom to build digital experiences that meet evolving business needs. When we support our partners and help them to grow their business with solutions that solve customers’ problems, increase transactions, and enable transformation, everyone profits," Persson concluded.
