After a tough 2024, Sonos CEO Patrick Spence is leaving the speaker company and board member Tom Conrad is stepping in as interim CEO.

Conrad was the CTO of Pandora, worked at Apple in the 90s and most recently was the chief product officer of Quibi. The Canadian-born Spence will stick with the company until June 30th, and once he leaves, he’ll be paid $1,875,000 USD (roughly, $2.7 million CAD).

Conrad appears keen on revitalizing Sonos and fixing the app, then moving the brand forward. In a letter to Sonos employees obtained by The Verge, he outlines a plan to get back to innovation that was at the heart of Sonos to help win back customers.

That said, as eager as Conrad may be, he’s only the interim CEO, so the company is still looking for someone to fill the role full-time. Spence was CEO of Sonos for eight years and was well-regarded until the app debacle in 2024.

On the Sonos subReddit, popular comments wonder if Maxime Bouvat-Merlin, Sonos’ chief product officer, will also share some of the blame since the product teams were a large part of the app’s failure. Overall, the commenters are happy that Spence is gone.

That said, beyond the initial disaster of releasing a super broken app, I felt that Spence came out strong in front of the issue and took the blame while instituting a quick plan to get most speakers back in working order. It’s tough to see him ousted this way, and it will be interesting to see what kind of CEO the Sonos board brings in to replace him.

Sonos also feels like it’s in a strong place leading into 2025 with products like the new Arc Ultra soundbar and staples like the Era 100. Leaks suggest that the company is also working on a streaming box to compete with devices like Apple TV, Roku and Amazon Fire TV.

Source: Sonos