Three senior MySpace executives leave

California, March 4: MySpace Chief Operating Officer Amit Kapur along with Jim Benedetto, senior vice president of engineering, and Steve Pearman, senior vice president of product strategy, are leaving the social-networking Website. The three top MySpace executives intend to start a new venture. Details of the new start-up were not available.

A statement from MySpace said of the departures, "We're incredibly excited to see what this team creates together and wish them the best of luck as they transition from helping run a company to building a new one. Amit, Jim, and Steve depart as great friends of MySpace and of our executive team. They will remain on board for the next few weeks to ensure a smooth transition company-wide."

However, David Bank, a New York-based analyst with RBC Capital Markets opined that the departures were coming at a time when one would want to see an element of certainty in the organization. According to him, such departures give a false impression of the impending executive turnover.

Founded in 2003, MySpace is headquartered in Beverly Hills, California. It is primarily a social networking site and does not disclose financial results separately from News Corporation, its parent organization. MySpace has lost a substantial market share to competitor Facebook last year. The latter now dominates the industry worldwide, while MySpace leads in the U.S market.

Kapur, who had taken over as the chief operating officer a little more than a year ago was one of MySpace's first employees and original architects of the company. He played a vital role in the launch of the MySpace Music joint venture. Moreover, business operations like MySpace.com, and MySpace Mobile reported into him.

This is not MySpace’s first encounter with departures in recent times. Last year it witnessed a number of executive shakeups. The three departures come a week after News Corp. Chief Operating Officer Peter Chernin put in his papers. The company did not divulge anything with regard to replacements for the departing executives.