In a press release, Magic Leap has announced that form Microsoft Executive Peggy Johnson is its new CEO. Magic Leap, which is best known for its Angry Birds first-person slingshot game, has pulled off quite to coup recruiting Johnson.
Conversely, Microsoft is in the middle of quite a reshuffle. The company has recruited a number of Movial employees into its in-house team. Johnson was Executive Vice President of Business Development at Microsoft and will come into her new role on August 1.
Magic Leap has a new CEO from Microsoft
In her 3o years of experience working in the technology industry, Johnson has built from a background as an electrical engineer. During her time at Microsoft, she led the company’s corporate venture fund, M12.
In a statement, Johnson sounded excited about the future of Magic Leap. She said, “I have long admired the relentless efforts and accomplishments of this exceptional team.”
In terms of what she hoped to bring to the role, Johnson was very ambitious about the growth of the company. She noted that she aims to “strategically build enduring relationships that connect Magic Leap’s game-changing technology”.
Johnson has also spent 24 years of her career at Qualcomm prior to her time at Microsoft. There she served as a member of Qualcomm’s Executive Committee.
Back in 2017, Johnson was named Business Insider’s “#1 Most Powerful Female Engineer in 2017”.
She was also named one of Silicon Republic’s “40 Powerful Women Leading Tech Around the World”. Johnson is also an inductee into the Women in Technology International hall of fame in 2013.
Johnson a big coup for Magic Leap
Magic Leap is an augmented reality start-up company which was born in 2011. Since then developers have created a Magic Leap One headset that released in 2018 as reported by Windows Central. This product flopped in terms of short term sales, falling well short of company targets.
Since then Magic Leap has shifted towards business sales which is largely as a result of this flop. In turn, this plays into why the company has recruited someone like Johnson. She has extensive experience working with business should be very successful in this area.
Furthermore, this is a very key moment in Magic Leap’s development. Given its shift to a more business sales focus the acquisition of Johnson comes at an important time.
The company will hope that someone of her calibre, as well as experience, can spearhead the company into this new area with great success.