Newton Running has appointed Stephen Gartside as company President. Effective on 5 March 2009, Gartside will run the day to day global operations of Newton Running and work closely with the company’s founders, Danny Abshire and Jerry Lee.
"Newton Running is poised for explosive success in the year to come, and Stephen’s background in sales and marketing, his leadership and experience around building businesses combined with his passion for endurance sports all fit very well with where we are taking the company," said Jerry Lee co-founder and Newton Running CEO.
Gartside has more than 20 years’ experience in running sales and marketing teams, and in senior roles building businesses including several years as the CEO of a global software company. From 1987-1997 Gartside served in various sales and marketing roles. In 1999, Gartside was the Senior Vice President of Terabeam, and he helped that organisation raise over US$500 million (€395 million) to launch its innovated communications product offer.
Since 2001 Gartside has served in various roles at Colorado based Evolving Systems including EVP Sales and Operations. Gartside served as President and CEO for Evolving Systems from late 2003 until mid 2007 during a time in which the company expanded its product offering and became a global supplier of solutions to the wireless industry. Gartside moved to the role of Chairman of Evolving Systems in 2007. Gartside is a life long endurance athlete completing an Ironman and over two dozen marathons, his first marathon at age 15 and his most recent at age 43. He has a BBA in Marketing from the University of Texas.
I am very excited to join Danny and Jerry as we work to take Newton to the next level," said Gartside. “The following that Newton Running has already created in the triathlon segment is unbelievable. I was sold on the company’s shoes as soon as I started using them in my personal running shortly after the company launched in 2007. Our goal is to expand our success in triathlon to general endurance running, and grow our business from a USA centric one to a respected global player in the performance running shoe segment of the market. Even in these current economic times, participation in endurance sports is growing, and we are extremely well positioned with a unique offering. Newton shoes allowed me to run faster. It’s as simple as that. "
