Did Rackspace Really Need a New Sales Executive?

Rackspace Hosting made an unexpected move last week when it hired Todd Cione to fill the newly created position of sales chief for the Americas.

It's not that Rackspace couldn't use a shot of adrenaline in the sales arm. The cloud computing leader's sales have lagged behind Street expectations in each of the last two quarters, leading to small but painful misses on the bottom line as well. As a direct result, the stock has missed out on this year's fantastic general market rally, losing about half its value year to date.

And there's nothing wrong with the talent Rackspace placed into this new position. Cione comes with 15 years of experience from highly responsible positions at Microsoft , most recently as chief operating officer of Redmond's Asia/Pacific operations. It's a big-name hire that should result in crisper execution across Rackspace's pan-American sales operations.

But Fool contributor Anders Bylund might have expected this move from a different part of his personal portfolio, namely big data manipulator TIBCO Software . In the video below, Anders explains why the Rackspace announcement took him by surprise -- even if it's probably the right thing to do.

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The article Did Rackspace Really Need a New Sales Executive? originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Anders Bylund owns shares of Rackspace Hosting and TIBCO Software, but he holds no other position in any company mentioned. Check out Anders' bio and holdings or follow him on Twitter and Google+.The Motley Fool recommends Rackspace Hosting and Tibco Software. The Motley Fool owns shares of Microsoft. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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