Former Napster President Brad Duea, who left the music-subscription service a year after Best Buy acquired the company for $121 million, has resurfaced at T-Mobile USA, a company spokesperson confirmed today.
Duea is the General Manager and VP of Communications, Applications and Media for T-Mobile, the fourth largest U.S. carrier. According to a number of third-parties we talked to, it’s hopeful that the executive will inject a scrappy, entrepreneurial mentality to the corporate vibe found at most carriers. In his favor is not having a strong background in mobile, ironically.
Duea joined T-Mobile in April, a month before T-Mobile announced that the current CEO Robert Dotson will be stepping down in February 2011. His replacement is Philipp Humm of T-Mobile’s German parent company, Deutsche Telekom (NYSE: DT), who is already in Bellevue, Wash. to work on the transition.
In recent years, carriers have had to move faster to stay relevant as Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Google (NSDQ: GOOG) have made consumers hungry for mobile data in addition to voice. T-Mobile gets credit for being the first to sell a phone running the Android operating system; for launching an open program for working with developers; and for running its own app store (which it has since scrapped). However, it suffers from customer losses and not having a clear go-to-market identity.
Additional details on Duea’s weren’t immediately available. Duea most recently served as president of Napster from January 2004 to February 2010. Best Buy bought the company in October 2008 for $112 million. According to Duea’s LinkedIn page, he oversaw the company as revenues increased from $12 million to $120 million, mobile revenues increased from zero to more than $10 million, and subscribers increased by more than 2,500 percent. Prior to Napster, Duea held roles at Roxio, now a division of Sonic Solutions, and PeopleSupport. He’s also a member of the State Bar of California.
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