Bruce Chizen

Bruce R. Chizen (born 1956) was the chief executive officer of Adobe Systems from 1994 to 2007. Chizen lives in Los Altos, California with his wife and children.

From 1980 to 1983, he worked in Mattel Electronics' merchandising group, helping it grow into a US$500 million business. In 1983, Chizen joined Microsoft as the company's eastern region sales director.

In 1987, he joined Claris as a founding senior manager and later held positions as vice president of sales and of worldwide marketing before becoming vice president and general manager of Claris Clear Choice.

In 1994 Aldus Corporation hired Chizen to run its Consumer Division in San Diego (what was formerly Silicon Beach Software). Later that year, Aldus was acquired by Adobe Systems and Chizen became Vice President and General Manager of Consumer Products.[1] He was named CEO of Adobe in April 2000. His most notable action as CEO was the acquisition of Macromedia.[2] In an interview, Chizen stated that the primary reason for acquiring Macromedia was to get Flash.[3] On November 12, 2007, Adobe Systems announced that Bruce Chizen would step down from his role as Chief Executive Officer effective December 1, to be replaced by Shantanu Narayen, Adobe's current president and Chief Operating Officer.

Bruce Chizen is a senior advisor for private-equity firm Permira and has been a Venture Partner with Voyager Capital since 2009.[1]. He also sits on the boards of Informatica, Oracle Corporation, Synopsys, Elemental Technologies, and NDS, a pay TV technology company. Chizen also sits on several nonprofit boards, including the Silicon Valley Education Foundation and of 1st Act Silicon Valley.

Chizen earned a bachelor's degree from Brooklyn College (City University of New York) in 1978.