Tony Bates
 | This biographical article is written like a résumé. (May 2012) |
Tony Bates | |
|---|---|
| Occupation(s) | President, Skype Division at Microsoft |
Tony Bates is President of the Skype Division at Microsoft. He is responsible for overseeing the company’s direction, strategy and overall mission to become a global communications platform that will eventually reach billions of users.[1]
Mr. Bates has over 20 years of leadership experience in the communications and Internet industries. An expert on Internet technologies, Mr. Bates has published 12 IETF RFCs in the areas of Internet Routing and Operations,[2] and he holds nine patents in the area of Layer 2 and Layer 3 innovations.[3]
Life and career
Bates was born in the U.K. He taught himself code by reading programming manuals on the way to work and began his career as a network operator at the University of London.
On October 4, 2010, Bates was named Skype’s Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors.[4] In 2007, Bates had listed Skype as one of four companies that he hoped would offer him the position of CEO before he turned 45.[5] During his tenure in this role, he oversaw the sale of Skype to Microsoft for $8.5 billion.[6]
Before joining Skype, Bates was Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cisco’s Enterprise, Commercial and Small Business Division, where he was responsible for its overall strategy and development direction. In this role, Mr. Bates was responsible for over $20 billion of annual revenue and managed over 12,500 employees worldwide.
In addition to running Cisco’s Enterprise Division, Bates also served as General Manager of Cisco’s Service Provider Group, responsible for annual revenue of $10 billion. Prior to that, he was the Vice President and General Manager of Cisco’s high-end router business. During his tenure, he was responsible for the strategy and development of Cisco’s flagship CRS-1 router, GSR, and Multi-Service WAN (MGX) product lines.[7]
Before working at Cisco, Bates spearheaded the backbone-engineering strategy for Internet MCI (MCI’s national IP backbone).
Bates has also served on the boards of a range of technology companies including YouTube, the video sharing website; TokBox, a provider of online video conference services; BubbleMotion, a voice-based messaging and blogging service; and LoveFilm, an online video streaming and rental service.[8]
Bates is married with four children and in his spare time enjoys skiing and tennis.
References and footnotes
- ^ "About Skype: Tony Bates". Skype.com.
- ^ "Tony Bates Data". IETF.
- ^ "USPTO Patent Full-Text & Image Database Search Results". US Patent & Trademark Office.
- ^ "Skype Appoints Cisco Senior Executive Tony Bates as New CEO". Skype.
- ^ "Skype CEO checked his list". FORTUNE.
- ^ "Skype: The inside story of the boffo $8.5 billion deal". FORTUNE.
- ^ "CrunchBase: Tony Bates". TechCrunch.
- ^ "Tony Bates Profile". LinkedIn.