Yankee, We Want You. Yankee, Go Home

It seemed like a fantastic opportunity for the entrepreneurial Henri Poole. He had co-founded and run Vivid Studios, a San Francisco-based Web consulting shop, before selling it in 1998 to Platinum Technology for $13 million. Then, after taking an 18-month break to travel and spend time with his newborn, Poole was approached by a group of European venture capitalists about becoming CEO of a French software company. In May, 2000, after a quick mating dance, Poole signed on to lead Paris-based MandrakeSoft, a two-year-old seller of Linux software.

Though Poole, then 36, was primed for a challenge, the Mandrake experience was tougher than he anticipated. Less than a year after joining MandrakeSoft, he departed after a split with the company's French founders over strategy. Poole had been hired to transform the company from a small Linux publisher into "a major software player," says Edward Walsh, former vice-president of communications, who resigned in July. In the end, the founders got cold feet about Poole's plan to turn the startup into a technology services provider.