Sybase announced yesterday an "executive transition" and a new move to create an embedded computing division. John Chen, who joined Sybase in 1997 and was appointed co-CEO with Mitchell Kertzman as the other co-CEO, is now given both reins, and Kertzman stays as Chairman. The move was foreseen in February when Chen, who was President and COO, took the additional title. At that time, Sybase was wounded from a $55 million loss in 1997, and an 11 percent reduction in the workforce, which cost $70 million in restructuring costs -- rather more than the $40 million envisaged as recently as February. Sybase turned a profit of $400,000 in its latest quarter. Sybase's three market growth areas were then seen to be Web computing, occasionally connected computing, and data warehousing. It was strange that Sybase's eponymous database was not specifically mentioned. Sybase formed its new mobile and embedded computing division because it says it "dominates the small database market for mobile computing with an estimated 22 percent market share". Terry Stepien will run the division, and report to Chen. Sybase's core development and marketing team will remain in Waterloo, Ontario, although the head office is in California. Sybase announced recently that in Q2 next year it would be incorporating Unisys' Universal Repository in Sybase's Enterprise Application Studio, scheduled for Q4 this year. In the latter half of 1999, Sybase plans to integrate the repository with other Sybase products, including Adaptive Server, Enterprise Connect, and Replication Server. ®