Ms Baker is a much-loved personality in the open source community and has helped steer efforts toward the creation of open source browsers to compete with Microsoft Internet Explorer since the early days of Netscape.
Mozilla Corporation is best known for its open source Firefox browser, which had a spectacularly successful 2007 and now boasts more than 125 million users worldwide.
Ms Baker said she was handing the CEO role to John Lilly, Mozilla’s current chief operating officer.
“John Lilly is the right person to guide the maturation of Mozilla,” Ms Baker said. “John has been instrumental in developing an organisation that is both embedded in Mozilla and open-source DNA and that can function at the extremely high degree of effectiveness that our setting requires.”
As CEO, Mr Lilly would focus on the product, technology and execution of the Mozilla, while Ms Mitchell would focus on bringing Mozilla goals and mindshare to affect change in related aspects of internet development – such as standards and interoperability, treatment of data, and use of market mechanisms to support public benefit organisations.
“I will remain an active and integral part of MoCo (Mozilla Corp),” Ms Baker wrote on her blog.
“I've been involved in shipping Mozilla products since the dawn of time, and have no intention of distancing myself from our products or MoCo. I'll remain both as the Chairman of the Board and as an employee,” she said.
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