Dive Brief:

• Peloton Interactive appointed Chief Accounting Officer Saqib Baig to serve as its interim CFO effective March 27 following the departure of finance chief Liz Coddington, according to a securities filing.
• The interim appointment comes approximately a month after the fitness company announced Coddington would be departing for an “external opportunity,” CFO Dive previously reported. In a separate release last month, energy firm Palmetto announced Coddington would be joining as their finance chief in a move effective March 30.
• The New York-based company’s interim appointment comes as Peloton continues with a global restructuring plan aimed at cutting down operating expenses as its subscriber figures continue to slump.

Dive Insight:

The company did not detail any compensation details related to the interim appointment in its filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Baig has served as CAO for the fitness equipment company since November 2022 and assumed the additional role of CFO for its commercial business unit last August, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Prior to joining Peloton, he served three years as controller for Facebook parent Meta, overseeing responsibilities including SEC reporting, internal reporting and automation, and policy governance. He has also held top finance roles at Colgate-Palmolive and GE Capital, as well as Big Four firms Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers and EY.  

Baig will step into the interim role as Peloton seeks to reverse a trend of declining subscriptions and to pare down costs after a sales slump following the highs the company reached during the COVID-19 pandemic. Last August, Peloton embarked on a restructuring plan aimed at achieving $100 million in run-rate savings by the end of its fiscal 2026, CFO Dive reported at the time. As part of that effort, the company cut 6% of its global workforce and announced plans to reduce indirect spending.

In January as part of the restructuring plan, the company announced it would be laying off a further 11% of its workforce, according to a report by Bloomberg. The cuts mostly impact members of the engineering team working on technology and enterprise customers, Bloomberg reported.

Peloton has also continued with efforts to reduce its operating expenses and bolster subscriptions, tapping artificial intelligence as part of its Peloton IQ product and embarking on a hardware refresh with a new equipment series focused on cross-training, according to a press release last October.

The restructuring plan has led to improvement in Peloton’s operating expenses, Coddington said during its earnings call for its most recent quarter ended Dec. 31. For its second quarter of fiscal 2026, operating expenses fell by 5% year-over-year to reach $364 million, according to its earnings report. Gross profit rose as well, increasing 4% YoY to approximately $331 million.

However, the company also reported a 7% drop in membership subscriptions for the quarter, which fell to 2.6 million.

Peloton did not immediately respond to requests for comment surrounding the interim appointment or if Baig is being considered for the permanent CFO role.