- OpenText (TSX/NASDAQ:OTEX) will appoint Ayman Antoun as board member and chief executive officer on April 20, 2026, keen to leverage his more than 35 years of progressive leadership roles at IBM to turn the company’s fortunes around
- OpenText is a top name in AI information management on a mission to protect and optimize how organizations interact with data
- OpenText stock has given back 17.14 per cent year-over-year and 39 per cent since 2021
OpenText (TSX/NASDAQ:OTEX) will appoint Ayman Antoun as board member and chief executive officer on April 20, 2026, keen to leverage his more than 35 years of progressive leadership roles at IBM to turn the company’s fortunes around.
Antoun served as president of IBM Americas from 2020-2023, overseeing the tech giant’s largest and most complex business, while spearheading projects spanning cloud, infrastructure and cybersecurity. Before that, from 2016-2020, he held the roles of president and general manager of global technology services at IBM Canada. Antoun was also senior vice president of business market sales at Bell Canada from 2013 to 2015.
The Harvard Business School and University of Waterloo graduate, who currently serves as a board member of TD Bank and CAE, replaces outgoing CEO James McGourlay, who will transition to a role within OpenText’s executive leadership team, clearing the way for the company to bounce back from poor returns since emerging from the COVID pandemic.
Despite stable and positive net income over the past five years, OpenText has failed to deliver more than marginal organic revenue growth, resulting in its stock price falling by 17.14 per cent year-over-year and 39 per cent since 2021.
The company fired long-time CEO Mark J. Barrenechea in August, followed by a strategic divestiture and numerous partnerships in a bid to better equip operations for long-term value creation.
Management commentary
“The board is very pleased to welcome Ayman to OpenText, and as we look ahead to the company’s future, the board believes that he is the best leader to drive shareholder value by growing revenue in our core Enterprise Information Management for training agentic AI business,” P. Thomas Jenkins, executive chairman and chief strategy officer at OpenText, said in a statement. “Ayman’s deep enterprise technology and software expertise and decades of leading large-scale global transformations will be a catalyst for OpenText’s next phase of growth.”
“On behalf of the board, I would like to thank James for his steadfast leadership as interim CEO and for the strong results we are realizing by his commitment to our clients,” Jenkins concluded. “I look forward to welcoming Ayman back home to Kitchener-Waterloo, where he grew up and went to school at the University of Waterloo, and to work with him, our board and executive leadership team as OpenText continues to advance its strategy.”
“OpenText’s core product portfolio, which is the foundation for training agentic AI, combined with its worldwide client base, offers the company a competitive advantage as trusted data is now essential to how economies, nations and businesses operate around the world,” Antoun added. “I am energized by the opportunity to lead OpenText into its next chapter and look forward to working with the board and leadership team to accelerate the company’s growth strategy and deliver long-term shareholder value.”
About OpenText
OpenText is a top name in AI information management on a mission to protect and optimize how organizations interact with data.
OpenText stock (TSX/NASDAQ:OTEX) is down by 5.82 per cent on the news trading for C$34.94 as of 9:55 am ET.
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