Two years after taking over the top job at SAIC [SAI], the company said yesterday that Walt Havenstein will be retiring as CEO effective June 15, 2012 for personal reasons.
Havenstein’s departure is a surprise, but he will help SAIC through what it hopes will be an orderly transition.
“The board of directors will conduct a thorough and thoughtful search for a successor, considering internal and external candidates,” Havenstein said in a statement. “The transition plan we have adopted will allow me to participate in the selection and we will assure a smooth transition.”
Before joining SAIC in June 2009, Havenstein led the United States-based operations of Britain’s BAE Systems. He became CEO of SAIC in September 2009.
Not long after taking over at SAIC, the government contracting environment began to grow increasingly uncertain as pressure began mounting for federal debt reductions that in turn means downward pressure on defense spending, continuing budget resolutions that forced lengthy contract award delays and increasing oversight of government contractors.
Havenstein answered this uncertain fiscal environment by focusing SAIC’s national security work into C4ISR, logistics and cyber security, all having the potential for double-digit growth. He has also been positioning the company for more business in the energy and healthcare sectors of the federal civilian market.
In the spring of 2010, Havenstein said that acquisitions would still be part of the company’s growth strategy, although in March 2011 he said the company would become more “bold” in its acquisitions, telling investors to look for the company to go after bigger targets than the bolt-on deals it typically does (Defense Daily, April 1, 2010, March 25).
“In the years that I have been with SAIC, we have put a strategy in place for the future, and we have structured a more agile, line-driven company to execute that strategy,” Havenstein said in a statement yesterday.