Semiconductor firm Marvell Technology Group announced the departure of CEO Sehat Sutardja and president Weili Dai (pictured), the husband and wife duo that formed the company in 1995, from their management positions.

They will remain on the board of directors, with Sutardja continuing as chairman.

Arturo Krueger, Marvell’s lead outside director, said, “the board believes that the time has come to move in a new leadership direction.”

“The company’s highest priority is to leverage Marvell’s strong core business and technology to drive the next stage of product innovation and profitable growth,” he added.

The board will conduct a search to replace Dai and Sutardja. In the meantime, it has formed an interim office of the CEO to oversee day-to-day leadership.

Maya Strelar-Migotti, executive VP, smart networked devices and solutions business group, and Pantelis Alexopoulos, executive VP of the storage business group, will serve as interim joint co-CEO and will have authority to exercise all powers of the CEO.

The news comes a day after the company said it had received a notice saying that the delay in filing its annual report for the financial year ending 30 January “serves as an additional basis” for having its securities delisted from the Nasdaq stock market. A hearing for this will be held on 14 April.

Marvell reiterated it is “working diligently” to complete the filing and earlier claimed the delay was due to PricewaterhouseCoopers resigning as its accountancy firm in October and because of an internal audit committee’s investigation of “certain accounting and internal control matters”.

The committee had identified certain “tone at the top” issues, including significant pressure on sales and finance personnel to meet revenue targets.

The chipmaker is also under federal investigation over issues including its accounting practices.

Marvell said last week its net revenue will likely take a hit because of decreased demand for its storage products, charges associated with settlement of litigation with Carnegie Mellon University “for an aggregate of $750 million,” as well as restructuring and severance related charges for its mobile platform business of approximately $75 million.