The new CEO of Avast has confirmed he will waive his annual salary and bonus from the company, instead receiving $1 (0.79 pounds).
Ondrej Vlcek took over from former CEO Vince Steckler this summer after the former led the company for a decade. Steckler confirms that one of his biggest achievements at Avast was the acquisition of AVG Technologies in 2016: “We didn’t just acquire a company, we gained the AVG team, AVG customers, and the carrier and channel partners. This expanded our user base to more than 400 million users worldwide. It was a big deal, and I’m very proud of what we all – everyone in both companies – were able to accomplish through it.”
Vlcek started at Avast in 1995 as a developer and was part of the team that took the company public. He also led the integration of the consumer business after the company bought AVG in 2016. He officially took on the role of CEO on June 30 2019, and plans to tackle major challenges on the consumer security side: “I see the Internet of Things (IoT) as a bit of a ticking time bomb – especially on the consumer side,” he explained on the Avast blog. “There’s something changing on the overall internet landscape: the majority of devices that are being connected to the internet are not computers and not mobile phones. They are smart devices, from coffee makers to smart TVs.
“And while people don’t tend to think of them as computers, they very much are – but often with a broken architecture when it comes to security.”
Vleck will donate his board director’s fee of $100,000 a year to UK-based charity Demelza Hospice for Children, according to Avast. In a statement, chairman of the remuneration committee Ulf Claesson said: “The board is satisfied that Vlcek continues to be appropriately incentivised through existing long term equity-based incentive arrangements and through his 2% shareholding in Avast.”