Three months after Safeguard Scientifics cut half of its staff as part of a restructuring of the investment firm, more changes are in the works. CEO Stephen Zarrilli and CFO Jeffrey McGroarty will soon be departing the investment firm, which has invested in healthcare, digital media, and finance companies.
Zarrilli, who has served in his role since 2012, has been with the firm for more than 10 years. He is scheduled to leave at the end of September. Safeguard’s Board of Directors named Brian Sisko to succeed Zarrilli effective July 1.
McGroarty will depart the firm June 30. David Kille, Safeguard’s corporate controller, will take on the CFO role starting June 1. Gary Kurtzman, managing director for healthcare, remains with the firm.
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The departures follow a tense conference call in March in which Sierra Capital, one of the firm’s largest shareholders, expressed dismay with the management and board’s team’s limitation on shareholders stake in the company to under 5 percent.
Safeguard’s investment structure, which is based on investing off of its balance sheet, as opposed to raising funds, has relied on a steady stream of exits but for the past few years exits have slowed or in some cases have failed to meet expectations.