Another Googler Gone: DoubleClick Boss David Rosenblatt Leaves for… Nothing

Doesn’t anybody want to sell ads for the world’s biggest media company anymore?

David Rosenblatt, the former CEO of DoubleClick, who joined Google when it acquired his company last year, is leaving May 15. A person familiar with Rosenblatt’s plans says he doesn’t have a job lined up but would like to run a public company, preferably one based in New York.

His role as chief of the company’s display ad sales group will be filled by Henrique De Castro, who has been working on Google’s European team.

Rosenblatt is the fourth high-profile ad executive to leave the Googleplex since March. The most notable, of course, is Tim Armstrong, now CEO at Time Warner’s (TWX) AOL. But Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, Google’s president for Asia-Pacific and Latin America, followed Armstrong out the door this month and is now at Accel Partners. A week later, top sales exec Omid Kordestani stepped aside, replaced by Nikesh Arora.

Unlike some of those moves, Rosenblatt’s departure, first reported by the New York Times, was anything but a surprise. Rosenblatt had a large fan club, some of whom wanted him to replace Armstrong, but the conventional wisdom was that he wouldn’t stay long at Google because he wants to run his own company again.

Here’s the note Rosenblatt sent out to associates announcing his departure, followed by the one Arora sent to Google employees today.

As you know, after eleven years of working for DoubleClick and one for Google, I have decided it is time to move on to the next phase of my career.  I will be leaving Google as of May 15.

I leave extraordinarily confident about the future of Google’s display business, and I continue to have no doubt that Google is the perfect home for DoubleClick.  Google’s display advertising strategy is revolutionary, and clients and employees will prosper as the company executes on that strategy.

As for my own future, in the near term, I will continue to work with the other companies that I am currently involved with.  I’m planning to take some time off this summer and then come back refreshed to begin to think about what comes next in my life and career.

My new email is xxx.  Please stay in touch

Hello, everyone –

As you know, we recently passed the first anniversary of our acquisition of DoubleClick.  We should all be proud of how successfully DoubleClick’s people, products and systems have been integrated with Google’s.  But there is a lot more still to do if we are to realize the full potential of our display business.

Having built DoubleClick into the world’s leading ad management platform, David Rosenblatt has decided to leave the company.  All of us have a learned a lot from David’s vision and leadership and we are grateful for his contributions, including the integration of DoubleClick into Google and the establishment of our display strategy.  David’s last day at Google is May 15th.

Henrique De Castro will be taking on a new role as Managing Director, Global Display and YouTube Advertising.  I can think of no better person to take our display business to the next level than Henrique.  He’s well respected within the product team, has a proven track record both inside and outside Google (having helped grow our European YouTube, Google Content Network and platforms businesses to over a billion dollars), speaks multiple languages and has lived in numerous countries (including Angola, Brazil and Mozambique).  Henrique is also a great cross-functional leader, having worked on a number of important YouTube partnerships including the BBC, the International Olympic Committee and the Vatican!

In his new role, Henrique will have direct responsibility for driving our sales, sales marketing and partnerships efforts for YouTube, the Google Content Network, our platforms and Ad Exchange. He will report to me, while working closely with Chad and Salar at YouTube, Neal on product, the regional sales leaders, OSO, marketing and PR, as well as partnerships.

Please join me in thanking David for his contribution and welcoming Henrique to his new role!

Nikesh