 Thoman and Gerstner were responsible for the remarkable rejuvenation of IBM's fortunes; Thoman was Senior Vice President and general manager of IBM's Personal Systems Group which he led a successful turnaround, and was later promoted to Senior Vice President and chief financial officer of IBM.However, as Gerstner had no plans to step aside in the 1990s, and being of a similar age, Thoman had to look outside for opportunities to run a major public company.When Thoman was announced as President and COO of Xerox, which positioned him as the eventual successor to Paul Allaire, this news caused the company shares to rise $2 (2.9%) to $71.75, after earlier touching a record $73.25 on the New York Stock Exchange.