Mark Barrenechea appointed President, CEO of OpenText

Issued by Global Research Partners for Open Text
Johannesburg, 19 Dec 2011

OpenText Corporation, the pre-eminent provider of enterprise content management (ECM) software, today announced that Mark Barrenechea has been named President and Chief Executive Officer of OpenText Corporation as of 2 January 2012.

Current President and Chief Executive Officer John Shackleton will retire from his executive role and from the OpenText board of directors as of 2 January 2012.

Mark Barrenechea: An established high-tech executive

With more than 20 years' of executive management and leadership experience in the high-tech industry, Barrenechea was named to the Rackable Systems board of directors in 2006 and served as Rackable's President and CEO. In that role, he led the acquisition of Silicon Graphics and was appointed President and CEO of SGI in May 2009, serving through December 2011.

Previously, Barrenechea served as Executive Vice-President and Chief Technology Officer for Computer Associates. Prior to this, he served as Senior Vice-President of Applications Development at Oracle Corporation and was part of the executive management committee, managing a multi-thousand-person global team and helping deliver release 11i of Oracle Applications. Barrenechea is 46-years-old and, in May 2011, the San Francisco Business Times named him 2011 Best Large Company CEO in recognition of his leadership and company growth. Barrenechea will also serve on the OpenText Corporation board of directors, and will relocate to Waterloo, Ontario.

John Shackleton: An instrumental leader for OpenText

John Shackleton and the board of directors have been actively working on a succession plan to fulfil the role of President and CEO upon his retirement. Shackleton will take on a consulting role through the end of the fiscal year assisting Barrenechea with the transition.

“On behalf of everyone at OpenText, I would like to express how instrumental John has been in growing the company since he came on board as President in 1998, and Chief Executive Officer in 2005,” commented Tom Jenkins, Executive Chairman of the Board and Chief Strategy Officer. “John's achievements during his 13 years as an executive at OpenText are remarkable. During that time, he guided the company as we grew from less than $100 million in revenue to more than $1 billion.”

“John's leadership was demonstrated many times as he guided the company through both challenging times as well as some of the most exciting moments in our company's history. Many of us at OpenText have benefited from John's professionalism and the insights he brought with him every day while achieving complex tasks such as integrating entire companies and product lines,” added Jenkins. “We wish him the greatest happiness in his retirement.”

“During my tenure at OpenText, I have had the privilege of working with some incredibly talented people, not only with our employees, but customers, partners and the investment community as well. I look forward to watching the company progress under Mark's leadership for many years to come,” concluded Shackleton.

For further information, please contact Rob Shaw: Tel: (+27) 83 626 3811, fax: (+27) 86 646 4178, e-mail: rshaw@opentext.com.

OpenText

OpenText, a global ECM leader, helps organisations manage and gain the true value of their business content. OpenText brings two decades' of expertise supporting 100 million users in 114 countries. Working with its customers and partners, OpenText brings together leading content experts to help organisations capture and preserve corporate memory, increase brand equity, automate processes, mitigate risk, manage compliance and improve competitiveness. For more information, visit www.opentext.com.

Certain statements in this press release may contain words considered forward-looking statements or information under applicable securities laws. These statements are based on OpenText's current expectations, estimates, forecasts and projections about the operating environment, economies and markets in which the company operates. These statements are subject to important assumptions, risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict, and the actual outcome may be materially different. OpenText's assumptions, although considered reasonable by the company at the date of this press release, may prove to be inaccurate and, consequently, its actual results could differ materially from the expectations set out herein. For additional information with respect to risks and other factors that could occur, see OpenText's Annual Report on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and other securities filings with the SEC and other securities regulators. Unless otherwise required by applicable securities laws, OpenText disclaims any intention or obligations to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

In southern Africa, OpenText's business partners are Business Connexion, Datacentrix, eTechnologies, iFuture Consulting, NokusaEI and SAP Africa; and, its customer base includes organisations from across both the private and public sectors such as Absa, Anglo Platinum, BMW, Department of Environmental Affairs, Department of Tourism, Distell, Engen, Exxaro Resources, Mittal Steel, Nedbank, Office of the President, Provincial Government of the Western Cape, SABMiller, Sasol, Standard Bank, Telkom SA and Toyota.

Copyright (c) 2011 by OpenText Corporation. OpenText, OpenText Everywhere and the OpenText ECM Suite are trademarks or registered trademarks of OpenText Corporation in the United States of America, Canada, the European Union and/or other countries. This list of trademarks is not exhaustive. Other trademarks, registered trademarks, product names, company names, brands and service names mentioned herein are property of OpenText Corporation or other respective owners.

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