ActiveState Appoints New CEO as Company Continues ‘Incredible Journey’

In 2023, private equity firm Vertu Capital announced the close of its inaugural fund, Vertu Partners Fund I, with more than $300 million in capital commitments from a range of institutional investors.

Vancouver-born ActiveState Software, which supports enterprise software developers in the creation and management of apps that use open source programming languages, was last year acquired by Toronto’s Vertu.

More than two million developers, including 97% of Fortune 1000 companies, use ActiveState’s solutions to save time, minimize risk and accelerate time to market.

Now, under the tutelage of Vertu Capital, ActiveState is undergoing changes.

One big change is that Stephen Baker is joining the company as chief executive officer. Baker replaces Bart Copeland, a longtime CEO who will continue involvement with the company as a member of its board of directors.

“Development teams at over 85% of organizations globally depend on open source programming languages,” explains Baker, 25-year tech industry veteran. “However, with software supply chain attacks tripling year-over-year, they struggle to strike a balance between productivity and security.”

ActiveState is unique, the incoming CEO says, “in that it makes both safety and innovation possible with secure open source integration, allowing developers to simply build with confidence.”

“I’m excited to work with this world-class team to build the industry’s most-loved secure open source integration platform and realize our vision of making open source software easy and safe for enterprises,” Baker stated.

“Stephen will be a terrific successor to Bart, he is uniquely able to carry forward ActiveState’s leadership and exemplary culture for clients and team alike,” believes Peter Lee, Vertu Operating Advisor and Chairman of the Board of ActiveState.

After a long stint at the helm, Copeland says he is looking forward to his role as a board member of ActiveState and remains “focused on the strategic direction of ActiveState and supporting Stephen and the Company in its next chapter of growth.”

“After a rewarding and fulfilling tenure as CEO spanning almost two decades, I couldn’t be happier to hand the reins over to Stephen to continue leading ActiveState on this incredible journey,” stated Copeland.

ActiveState was founded in BC in 1997 by local technology visionary Dick Hardt.