Tremor Founders to Exit Video Ad Firm

The founders of online video ad network Tremor Media announced yesterday they will leave the company. According to an internal company memo sent to ClickZ News, COO Andrew Reis and Chief Strategy Officer Jesse Chenard will exit the company they started in the hopes of building another from scratch.

Reis is expected to remain on the board of directors, according to an e-mail sent to all U.S. and European employees by Tremor Media CEO Jason Glickman. “As such, you can expect to see Andrew walking [the halls of] Tremor Media from time to time…and knowing Andrew, we had better all be on our toes,” wrote Glickman. Chenard will serve as a strategic advisor to the video network.

“With these changes, we have the opportunity to reorganize several areas of the company with a new structure that will put us in a position to further capitalize on the significant traction we are gaining in the market place,” continued Glickman.

Calling the departures “mutual,” Glickman told ClickZ News during a phone interview today that they are “part of the natural evolution of the company” and “in the works for awhile.”

Current CFO Mark Pinney will expand his responsibilities to include building, delivery, and optimization of the Tremor network, according to the memo. The IT, facilities, operations and network development departments will now report to Pinney. “Combining these groups into one cohesive team, along with Business Intelligence, will allow us to drive more process rigor and quantitative firepower into…the development of our network and delivery of our campaigns,” wrote Glickman.

VP Business Operations Rob Grossberg has been promoted to SVP of business operations and strategy. In addition, Glickman said he will increase his focus on the firm’s technology and product development; teams in those departments will now report to him. “Our continued technology development creates enormous value for the company and the new structure will allow me to provide greater input into the prioritization of projects and our long term strategy,” Glickman noted.

Charles Parra will now head the product development group, and Lara Fitch will serve in a new role focused on “advertiser facing operations and strategy,” reporting to Grossberg. The company will also bring together its systems engineering team and technology group; VP Information Technology Mark Fogg will report to SVP Engineering Steven Pearson.

“The management brain trust made up of myself, Steve Pearson, Charles Parra, Rob Grossberg, and Mark Fogg will work closely together to streamline our processes for technology development and innovation,” added Glickman.

In June, Tremor unveiled a collection of enhanced pre-roll ad formats. The in-banner and in-stream video ad net claims to deliver ads to over 1,400 publisher sites.