Big morning of board changes at Micro Focus

The FTSE 250 firm said both Murdoch and Brauckmann would report to executive chairman Kevin Loosemore. Murdoch was rejoining the board, having been a director from April to November 2014.

Micro Focus said Stephen Murdoch initially joined the company in November 2012, and was currently chief operating officer of Micro Focus.

"Murdoch has a 25 year track record of success in the IT industry spanning hardware, software and services", the company's board said in a statement.

"He has held senior executive positions in general management, sales and strategy with IBM and Dell", it added.

Nils Brauckmann had been president of the SUSE subsidiary since May 2011, having more than 20 years of management and leadership experience in the IT industry prior to that.

Additionally, Steve Schuckenbrock was joining the board as an independent non-executive director.

"Schuckenbrock is chief executive at CROSSMARK, a leading sales and marketing services company. After more then 30 years of leadership experience in global companies such as Dell, EDS, PepsiCo, Frito-Lay and IBM, his expertise spans sales, marketing and technology", Micro Focus' board said.

Other changes include the stepping down of David Golob and Prescott Ashe, who had been representing Wizard on the board since the TAG acquisition. They were leaving their posts to ensure an appropriate balance of independent and non-independent directors, whough Wizard would retain the right to appoint one non-executive director to the board.

Micro Focus also announced that Karen Geary, non-executive director and chair of the company's remuneration committee, would be joining Micro Focus as Group Human Resources Director from 1 March.

Current Group Human Resources and Business Operations Director, Paul Rodgers, was stepping full time into the role of Group Business Operations and Integration Director.