Verifone Appoints Francisco Partners Veteran Mike Kohlsdorf as CEO

Global payment solution provider Verifone has appointed one of its advisors, Mike Kohlsdorf, as its new CEO.

Kohlsdorf has been a senior operating partner affiliated with Francisco Partners, the owner of Verifone, since 2011 and has served as CEO of eight of that firm’s portfolio companies, Verifone said in a Tuesday (Aug. 1) press release. He has been an advisor to Verifone since 2018.

He succeeds Mike Pulli, who is stepping down as CEO after five years, the release said.

Peter Christodoulo, partner at Francisco Partners, said in the release: “Since we originally acquired the company in 2018, we have been focused on completely transforming Verifone into a modern payment services platform. We thank Mike Pulli for his leadership the last five years and are excited for Mike Kohlsdorf to join and further position Verifone as a leader in the broader payments space.”

Under Pulli’s leadership, Verifone was transformed from a provider of payment terminals and related legacy services to a modern FinTech platform, according to the press release.

Today, the platform has cloud-based software and services in over 165 countries and processes over 12 billion transactions worth over $500 billion each year, the release said.

As the new CEO, Kohlsdorf is tasked with driving Verifone’s next phase of growth, per the release.

“The company has a great opportunity to continue to scale its end-to-end payment services offering to more merchants and consumers around the world,” Kohlsdorf said in the release. “Verifone’s greatest assets are its employees and its customers, and I intend to put them at the center of everything we do. The company is well positioned to continue its upward trajectory.”

Francisco Partners’ $3.4 billion acquisition of Verifone was announced in April 2018 and become effective five months later, in August 2018.

Pulli became Verifone’s CEO as part of the acquisition and said at the time that Francisco Partners would help the firm transform from a terminal sales company to a leading provider of payments and commerce solutions.

In Tuesday’s press release, Pulli said: “I am so proud of our people, products and positioning in the market. Our amazing customers have given Verifone incredible support as they launched our solutions and endorsed our strategy.”