AST Gets Top Salesman in Diery, Colleagues Say

SAN FRANCISCO —  Newly appointed AST Research chief Ian Diery was known by colleagues at Apple Computer Inc. as a salesman’s salesman.

“Diery’s a good front man,” said Mark Hall, editor of MacWeek, a computer industry newspaper. “If what AST needs is someone to get the troops motivated to sell machines, then he’s right for the job.”

Diery was at Apple for six years. An Australian with a hearty laugh and a fondness for playing rugby and riding horses in his spare time, he was generally popular among the Apple sales force. But he was also known as a boss who could crack the whip if sales goals were not met.

While at Apple, Diery, 46, was credited with putting Apple on the map in the Far East. During Diery’s tenure as senior vice president of Apple Pacific, Apple became the second-largest personal computer supplier to Japan, a market worth billions of dollars to the company.

After that success, Diery was promoted to executive vice president of worldwide sales and marketing, and eventually to general manager of the company’s personal computer division.

A particular bright spot in Diery’s career was the launch of the Apple Powerbook, a line of portable computers that became a huge success for the Cupertino, Calif., personal computer maker after the company had stumbled badly with an earlier portable that was overpriced and clunky compared with competing machines.

And Diery was instrumental in the smooth transition to the Power PC, Apple’s new line of Macintosh computers, which featured entirely different hardware and software than earlier models.

But Diery is not known as a strategist.

“Ian is a doer, not a thinker,” said one former Apple insider. And unlike many executives in the computer industry, he is not a technologist.

Diery ran afoul of Chief Executive Michael Spindler when he criticized the plan to license the Macintosh software to other hardware makers who would then compete with the company by selling Apple clones. In April, Diery was forced out during a reorganization.

Diery is one of four top executives who have left Apple this year.

Before Apple, Diery served in various executive roles at Wang Laboratories, including executive vice president, worldwide field operations, senior vice president, U.S. sales operations and senior vice president, Europe.

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Career Profile: Ian Diery

Company: AST Research Inc.

Title: President/CEO; board member

Birthplace: Sydney, Australia

Age: 46

Previous positions: Joined Wang Laboratories in 1978 as a sales representative and rose to executive vice president for worldwide operations. Left in 1989 to join Apple Computer as senior vice president and head of the company’s international unit, Apple Pacific. Became executive vice president and general manager of Apple’s Personal Computer division in 1993. Resigned April, 1995.

Source: AST Research Inc.