August 3, 2026 • 4 min read
Avaya Appoints Jeff Clarke as CEO, Patrick Dennis as Executive Chair
CX Analyst & Thought Leader
August 3, 2026
Today, Avaya appointed 30-year enterprise technology veteran Jeff Clarke as CEO, with Patrick Dennis staying on Avaya Executive Chair. Clarke joins Avaya from his role as CEO at Insurity, a PE-owned cloud platform for insurance carriers. Clarke also served as CEO and Executive Chairman at Doxin, a customer communications management and engagement company for highly regulated markets.
Clarke expanded on his vision for Avaya in an exclusive quote to the CX Foundation:
"Customers don't judge us by our strategy. They judge us by every interaction they have with us, and that's the mindset I'm bringing to this role. Avaya sits at a real inflection point — enterprises need a partner who can bring AI into the flow of every customer interaction without losing the reliability they've always counted on. That's exactly the opportunity in front of us, and it's why now is the right moment for me to join. I'm looking forward to working with this talented team to be relentlessly customer-obsessed and build the lasting connections our customers deserve.
During his tenure as Avaya CEO, Patrick Dennis oversaw the launch of Avaya Infinity and Avaya Nexus while deepening Avaya's AI capabilities and customer relationships. After Avaya's 2023 bankruptcy, Dennis led Avaya through its transition to focus on its top 1,500 global clients and its decision to discontinue services like SIP trunking and communication APIs. In November 2025 under Dennis, Avaya's credit rating rose from C++ to B- , signaling progress in the company's restructuring, although it did come at the costs of global workforce reductions.
Dennis, who sat down with the CX Foundation to discuss his strategy for Avaya several times, said in an exclusive quote:
"Over the past two years, we've worked with real intention to deepen our customer relationships, bring Avaya Infinity and Avaya Nexus to market, and put AI to work in ways that genuinely help our teams and our customers move faster together. I'm proud of the foundation we've built, and I'm confident it positions Avaya well for its next phase of growth.
Patrick Dennis
What This Means For Avaya
Clarke's appointment seems to signal a continuation of the post-bankruptcy stability Dennis brought to Avaya, which still carries around $800 million in debt from its 2023 Chapter Eleven bankruptcy (with obligations coming due August 2028).
There's a clear pattern here, given Clarke is best known for his incredible Kodak turnaround. Clarke was appointed Kodak CEO in 2014 after the photography giant's Chapter Eleven bankruptcy in 2012. By the end of 2016, Clarke helped Kodak reach its first annual profit since bankruptcy by rebuilding Kodak around printing and chemicals. Clarke famously made the decision to keep celluloid film in production at Kodak, making deals with household names like Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino.
While I'd like to personally thank him for that, the important thing to notice is that, like Dennis, much of Clarke's professional resume consists of preparing PE-held companies for one of two things: a future sale or major restructuring. This take isn't exactly shocking, but it does reinforce the reality that historically on-prem providers are struggling to find their footing in today's market.
My colleague Zeus Kerravala, Founder and Principal Analyst of ZK Research, seems to share a similar sentiment in an exclusive quote to the CX Foundation, saying:
"Bringing in a veteran of legacy turnarounds like CA Technologies, HP, and Kodak suggests Avaya's board is prioritizing operational discipline, debt management, and account retention over agressive cloud disruption. Jeff Clarke is a seasoned operator, but his playbook historically focuses on optimizing mature legacy assets - not outpacing agile, cloud-native AI innovators."
Zeus Kerravala
We'll see what the future holds for Avaya (and, by extension, the historically on-premises market). Watch this space for continued updates.