Slack Chief Executive Officer Stewart Butterfield plans to leave the workplace messaging platform in January, parent company Salesforce Inc said on Monday.

Lidiane Jones, who is the senior vice-president of product management for Salesforce Commerce Cloud, will take over as CEO of Slack, a company spokesperson said.

Business Insider had first reported the news earlier in the day.

Shares in Salesforce, a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, slumped about 4%.

Salesforce had acquired Slack last year in a nearly $28 billion deal following a massive bet that Slack's workplace app will become popular for collaborations within and between companies.

Last week, Salesforce stock tumbled after co-CEO Bret Taylor's sudden exit caught Wall Street off guard and raised concerns about the merit in having two leaders.

  - Reuters