Zoom Australia and New Zealand boss quits

Michael Chetner, video conferencing company Zoom's head of Australia and New Zealand, has announced on LinkedIn that he has resigned.

Chetner spent almost six years at Zoom, running the Australia and New Zealand business, having joined from Cisco.

His resignation follows Zoom this month making 15 per cent of staff redundant, including its New Zealand regional sales manager Jaron Burbidge and other staff in the country.

Zoom rose to fame during the COVID-19 pandemic when people were forced to work from home in lockdowns.

Facing rapid growth due to burgeoning demand for video conferencing solutions, Zoom tripled in size in just two years, its founder Eric Yuan said.

However, the extraordinary growth tapered off as pandemic-related restrictions were relaxed, and Zoom's share price more than halved in 2022.

Yuan said the company made mistakes during its rapid expansion.

"We didn't take as much time as we should have to thorougly analyse our teams or assess if we were growing sustainably, towards the highest priorities," he said.

Zoom said it would offer the 1300 employees made redundant across the company support and assistance.

For United States employees, this includes up to 16 weeks salary, bonus payments for the 2023 financial years, and outplacement services.

The company said "Zoomies" outside the US would get similar support, with local laws taken into account, and share option vesting until August this year.

Yuan said he is accountable for the mistakes made while growing the company, and would reduce his salary by 98 per cent and forego his corporate bonus, for the 2023 financial year.

Zoom's leadership team will have their base salaries cut by a fifth "while forfeiting their FY23 corporate bonuses," Yuan announced.