ComiXology co-founder David Steinberger has announced that he is stepping down as CEO of the company after 15 years, hinting at a new role within Amazon.
“It’s been a few big weeks, and I have personal news: I’ve been asked if I’d like to lead a new Amazon-wide initiative that is too good an opportunity to not take,” Steinberger tweeted. “It was a tough decision, but I’m ready for a new entrepreneurial challenge. I will love comics forever and I will continue to be an Advisor to ComiXology.”
Steinberger named Tom Ashley and Jeff DiBartolomeo as “two long-term ComiXology leaders” who had worked with him for the past 9 years and would be managing the team moving forward. At the moment, Ashley works as the company’s Head of Product, UX and Subscriptions, while DiBartolomeo is ComiXology’s Chief Technology Officer.
2/ …I will continue to be an Advisor to @Comixology. Two long-term Comixology leaders, Tom Ashley and Jeff DiBartolomeo, will be managing the team moving forward. Tom and Jeff have been by my side for 9 years, and I can’t wait to see them execute their ideas for Comixology.
— David Steinberger (@stonemtn) March 10, 2022
“I’m extremely confident in Jeff and Tom, the rest of the ComiXology leadership team, and the many passionate, comics-loving employees that strive day-in & day-out to make everyone on the planet lifelong fans,” Steinberger added in follow-up tweets. “To all Comixologists: I’ve learned so much from you. Thank you.”
Steinberger also thanked the publishers that worked with ComiXology over the years as well as his original co-founders, John D. Roberts and Peter Jaffe. The trio founded the company in 2007 and oversaw its rise into the digital comic industry’s number one marketplace and app. Roberts, responding to Steinberger’s post, wrote that the company was in good hands and shared a screenshot of a very early digital storefront that eventually evolved into the ComiXology of today.
ComiXology was purchased by Amazon in 2014, and at the time of the purchase Steinberger said that there was no better home for ComiXology than Amazon. The company was largely left as a separate marketplace until early 2022.
In February, the ComiXology storefront folded into Amazon.com to coincide with a revised version of the app that allowed for integration with Amazon’s Kindle marketplace. The integration has been blasted by fans as buggy and short-sighted, particularly since ComiXology’s desktop reading options were removed in the transition, forcing users who read comics on their computer to use Amazon’s desktop Kindle app, which was designed for prose books and not comics. Other customers complained of trouble accessing their libraries, while users outside of the United States lamented that they could no longer subscribe to any series.
Following the bungled integration, ComiXology admitted that the “process has been far from seamless” and promised to implement fixes in the near future.
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