The CEO of analytics firm Splunk, Doug Merritt, has resigned, effective immediately, without warning.

A company statement titled “Splunk Announces CEO Transition” offers no reason for Merritt’s departure.

Indeed, the document offers good reason to keep it around, revealing preliminary third-quarter 2021 revenue of “around $ 660 million, or 19% year-over-year growth. other”.

The document offers the usual platitudes about Merritt’s tenure and reveals that while Splunk searches for a replacement president, Graham Smith will take on the CEO role. Merritt will remain on an advisor to ease the transition.

So why did Merritt leave? The register has a theory: the paper thanks the former CEO for the efforts that “have enabled the company to become the leading data platform for security, observability and IT.”

But Splunk has long declared its ambition to break out of the IT ghetto and enter the broader analytics market to serve HR, marketing and finance teams.

Splunk has plenty of competition in this business. Maybe Merritt wasn’t seen as the right leader to bring the company there? Or run a business of the size needed to serve more niches?

Whatever the reason for his departure, investors hate it: Splunk’s stock price fell 18% on news of the former CEO’s departure. ®