The new CEO of Astronomer, the data company embroiled in the Coldplay kiss cam scandal, has described the newfound attention as “unusual and surreal”.
Pete DeJoy stepped up to the plate after the former CEO, Andy Byron, resigned on Saturday after being caught in an embrace with his company’s chief people officer, Kristin Cabot, at a concert last week.
“Oh, what...either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy,” Coldplay frontman Chris Martin quipped as the pair ran away from where they were standing.
A social media storm followed as the clip went viral and was widely covered by the media.
“The events of the past few days have received a level of media attention that few companies – let alone startups in our small corner of the data and AI world – ever encounter,” DeJoy said in a statement on LinkedIn.
However, DeJoy suggested a silver lining in that the furore had brought the New-York company into the spotlight.
“The spotlight has been unusual and surreal for our team and, while I would never have wished for it to happen like this, Astronomer is now a household name,” DeJoy said.
DeJoy boasted that Astronomer, a company that began as a software company in Cincinnati, Ohio, "never shied away from challenges," including a recovery from “the collapse of the bank that held all our cash” and expanding from 30 to 300 people during the Covid-19 pandemic.
He went on to add: “We’re here because Astronomer is built by people who live to solve hard problems, stay late to fix what’s broken, and care deeply about doing things the right way.”
On Saturday, Astronomer released a statement saying their leader had flouted the company’s values when he was caught in the act.
“Our leaders are expected to set the standard in both conduct and accountability, and recently, that standard was not met,” the company statement read.
“Before this week, we were known as a pioneer in the DataOps space, helping data teams power everything from modern analytics to production AI. While awareness of our company may have changed overnight, our product and our work for our customers have not.”
The company also squashed rumors online that other employees were at the concert with the duo, and thus knew about the affair.
“Alyssa Stoddard was not at the event and no other employees were in the video,” the company wrote in its statement.
Byron’s wife, Megan Byron, 50, is reportedly laying low at the family's $2.4million Maine mansion as crisis talks unfold over her marriage, The Daily Mail reported Monday.
Cabot is believed to be on leave, but the details of her employment with Astronomer remain unclear, reports The New York Post.
