Western Digital has announced that Tim Leyden has been appointed chief operating officer while Wolfgang Nickl senior vice president and chief financial officer. Both executives will report to John Coyne, president and chief executive officer of WD.

Leyden has been with WD for more than 20 years in a variety of worldwide finance, manufacturing and information technology leadership positions. From Dec. 2001 to May 2007, Leyden served in senior finance capacities at the U.S. subsidiaries of Sage Group PLC. Since 2007, Leyden served as executive vice president and chief financial officer of WD. As COO he will have responsibility for the company's sales, business unit, marketing, operations, engineering and materials groups.

 The company's finance, customer satisfaction, human resources, IT and legal functions will continue to report to John Coyne and business development will now report directly to Coyne.

Succeeding Leyden in the CFO role, Wolfgang Nickl has served as WD's vice president of finance since Oct. 2005. Prior to that, Nickl served in leadership positions in the company's worldwide business operations for several years. He joined WD in 1995 from IBM.

 "These new roles reflect the excellence, depth, passion and experience of the WD leadership team," said Coyne. "We are pleased to have developed such strong talent at WD as we continue our mission to grow the business profitably and address multiple new markets."