Hearsay Social Names First CFO Amid International Push

Hearsay Social, a San Francisco-based social media management startup, has hired Bill Salisbury as its first chief financial officer, according to CEO Clara Shih.

Salisbury was most recently CFO of Avast Software, and had a long career at Morgan Stanley before that. In an interview with Re/code, Shih says Salisbury joined Hearsay after she spent more than a year hunting for the right candidate.

Hearsay is just now beginning to expand internationally, which will be a major part of Salisbury’s role, Shih explained. The company opened its first European office a year ago and just expanded into Asia last month. Salisbury will help get these offices up and running and manage the international investment portion of the process.

Usually when younger companies hire an experienced CFO, it signals something else may be on the horizon: An initial public offering. Shih says that isn’t the case here, at least not right now.

“We’ve certainly discussed it, but it’s not a specific milestone we’re working towards right now,” she said. “Staying private allows you to have more flexibility and freedom to focus on your business instead of managing shareholders.”

Hearsay Social is growing quickly, she added. The company specializes in financial and insurance advisers who want to better connect with customers using social media as a medium. She says that Hearsay has more than 100,000 people using the service to do just that.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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