Best Buy (BBY 0.20%) announced yesterday that Stephen Gillett, executive vice president and president of Best Buy Digital, is leaving the electronics retailer for Symantec (GEN 0.59%). He will become executive vice president and COO at Symantec starting tomorrow.
Gillett, 36, joined Best Buy nine months ago from his previous position as executive vice president and chief information officer at Starbucks (SBUX 0.53%).
"We are grateful for Stephen's contributions during his time at Best Buy and we wish him well as he returns to his roots and assumes a very senior role at Symantec," said Best Buy President and CEO Hubert Joly in a statement.
Gillett's responsibilities have been redistributed among several senior executives, including Best Buy's CFO, president of online and global e-commerce, and senior vice president of U.S. retail.
Gillett has served on Symantec's Board since January 2012, but will step down effective immediately as he assumes his new role at that company.
In a Symantec press release, Chairman and CEO Steve Bennett said that "Stephen is the perfect fit for the direction we are taking Symantec. He has been deeply involved in the transformation of a number of high profile companies at the executive level and is highly respected in the CIO community worldwide."
According to an SEC filing, his annual base salary at Symantec will be $875,000 with an annual bonus target of 125% of his annual base salary. He will receive a signing bonus of $1.313 million. In addition, according to the SEC fling, Symantec will pay him $2.552 million "to help defray the cost to repay certain obligations to his current employer."
