One of the most influential personalities in publishing, Peter W. Olson, Random House CEO, resigned his position on May 20, 2008. He had acted as CEO of Random House since 1998. Random House is the world’s largest consumer publisher. Among its imprints are Bantam Dell, Crown Publishing Group, Doubleday, Knopf, and Ballantine.  Allegedly, Bertelsmann AG, Random House’s parent company, exerted pressure on Olson to leave. Despite several recent high profile successes, Random House sales fell nearly 6% in the past year.  Markus Dohle, CEO of Arvato Print also a Bertelsmann unit, will take on the post. According to the New York Times, Hartmut Ostrowski, the new CEO of Bertelsmann, wanted to remove Olson in order to install his own executive.