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Tim Westergren
Pandora cofounder and CEO Tim Westergren has stepped down, the company announced on Tuesday.The board will begin searching for candidates to fill the position, and CFO Naveen Chopra will serve as interim CEO. Westergren, who cofounded Pandora back in 2000, will also no longer serve on Pandora's board of directors.
This news comes on the heels of a $480 million investment from Sirius XM earlier this month, which will give the satellite-radio powerhouse 19% of Pandora, in addition to three board seats. At the same time, Pandora announced it would unload Ticketfly - the ticketing startup it paid $335.3 million in stock and cash for in 2015 - to Eventbrite for $200 million.
Westergren took over the CEO role last March, mostly to guide the company's launch of its on-demand competitor to Spotify and Apple Music, which completed its rollout in April. The $9.99-a-month service, called Pandora Premium, was meant to wring money out of Pandora's massive user base in a more effective way than its ad-supported product. Grumblings are, however, that Sirius XM has little interest in this service.
Pandora's stock was flat following the news.