Skillsoft Announces Leadership Transition

Skillsoft (NYSE: SKIL) (the “Company”), a leading platform for transformative learning experiences, today announced that Ronald Hovsepian has been appointed as the Company’s Executive Chair and will serve as principal executive officer, effective as of April 16, 2024. This appointment follows Jeffrey R. Tarr’s decision to retire from his role as Chief Executive Officer and as a member of the Board of Directors, also effective April 16, 2024. To ensure a smooth transition, Mr. Tarr will serve in an advisory capacity over the coming weeks.

Mr. Hovsepian has served as a Skillsoft Board member since 2018, including as Executive Chair from 2018 to 2021. In this capacity, he was instrumental in overseeing the Company’s migration away from its legacy Skillport platform, accelerating the transition to Skillsoft’s innovative Percipio platform, and laying the foundation for Skillsoft to become a leader in best-in-class, transformative learning experiences. Mr. Hovsepian also played a key role in strengthening the Company’s operational and financial foundation, paving the way for Skillsoft to return to the public markets in 2021.

“Given Ron’s long history with Skillsoft and deep understanding of the business and strategy, the Board is confident he is the right person to provide continuity of leadership and guide the Company forward,” said Patrick Kolek, Skillsoft’s prior Chair. “Ron is a proven leader with an impressive track record, and his insights will be instrumental as we work to unlock value for Skillsoft, our stockholders and other stakeholders.”

Mr. Hovsepian also has a wealth of executive leadership and operational experience in the technology and software industries, most recently serving as President and CEO of Indigo Ag, an agricultural technology company. Previously, he served as President and CEO of Intralinks, a global provider of SaaS collaboration solutions; was President and CEO of Novell, a leader in networking and Linux software; and held various leadership roles at IBM. Mr. Hovsepian is currently Chairman of the Ansys Board of Directors, on which he has served since 2012.

“As organizations continue adapting to the world of Generative AI and transition to a skills-centric economy, Skillsoft is well positioned to seize the tremendous market opportunity ahead,” said Mr. Hovsepian. “With an industry-leading suite of multi-modal learning solutions and a platform that delivers measurable and outcomes-based learning for the world’s largest and most complex organizations, Skillsoft continues to be a pioneer in charting the course for the future of learning. I look forward to working alongside our talented leadership team and have the utmost confidence in our ability to execute on our strategic priorities to drive Skillsoft’s future success.”