Business

Peloton appoints Twitter exec as new chief product officer

by Nick Robertson - 09/26/23 9:30 PM ET

FILE - A Peloton bike sits on Nov. 19, 2019, in San Francisco. Peloton managed to beat sales expectations during its fiscal fourth quarter, but the exercise equipment maker reported a bigger loss than anticipated partly due to recall costs and a shift in consumer spending. Shares plunged more than 27% before the market open on Wednesday, Aug. 23, 2023. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File) — FILE – A Peloton bike sits on Nov. 19, 2019, in San Francisco. Peloton managed to beat sales expectations during its fiscal fourth quarter, but the exercise equipment maker reported a bigger loss than anticipated partly due to recall costs and a shift in consumer spending. Shares plunged more than 27% before the market open on Wednesday, Aug. 23, 2023. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

A former Twitter executive will join Peloton as its chief product officer, the company announced Tuesday, replacing a company co-founder in the role.

Nick Caldwell was named for the position on Tuesday, joining the leadership team of a company that has faced difficulty maintaining the rocketing growth it experienced during the COVID pandemic.

“Nick brings impressive engineering, design, and product experience to the Peloton team. Nick joins us at an exciting time as we lean into growing our subscriber base online and on our connected fitness hardware,” CEO Barry McCarthy said in a statement.

Caldwell held leadership roles at Microsoft, Reddit and Google before working as Twitter’s vice president of engineering and general manager for nearly two years until Elon Musk purchased the company in late 2022.

Peloton sales dropped in the fourth quarter but still beat investor expectations. The company has struggled with pricey product recalls and moving towards a subscription-focused revenue model.

About 6.5 million people subscribe to Peloton’s membership programs, a 5 percent drop from the previous quarter.

The company went through mass layoffs in early 2022 as the company was wrecked by the end of a booming pandemic business, which ended in the resignation of its CEO and co-founder John Foley.

McCarthy has attempted to re-orient the company’s revenue via leaning on the subscription model and adding a leading option for Peloton exercise equipment.

Tags John Foley Nick Caldwell