The parent company of Ancestry.com has hired away the chief financial officer of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc.

Howard Hochhauser will join The Generations Network Inc., a Provo online genealogy services company, on Jan. 12, officials announced Friday. Hochhauser resigned on Wednesday from his position as chief financial officer of Martha Stewart Living, a diversified media and merchandising company.

"Howard brings over 15 years of broad media and online content experience, bolstered by years of working with a solid base of loyal consumers who are similar in profile to ours," said Tim Sullivan, chief executive of The Generations Network. "He understands online content, subscription models and how to manage a public company. These are beneficial to us, and it gives us the flexibility we seek as a private company, especially since there's a chance we may want to go public."

"The Generations Network has built one of the most compelling subscription Internet businesses today," Hochhauser said in a statement Friday. "I am delighted to be joining a first-rate management team, as we leverage the business model to capitalize on the growth opportunities that are clearly ahead for us."

At a time when many companies are facing growth challenges in a recessionary environment, The Generations Network is enjoying a 19 percent jump in gross revenues to around $200 million, and a 60 percent jump in profits to more than $60 million for fiscal 2008, Sullivan said.

"There's never been as much interest in family history as there is now," he said. "This year, we have achieved 20 percent more new subscriptions over the holiday period, compared with a year ago. So far, our business has seen little impact from the downturn because people who are interested in family history remain passionate about it."

The company is closely monitoring the retention and subscription rates to its services as the recession deepens, and plans to "invest cautiously in building new services, acquiring and digitizing massive amounts of data content and managing the back-end technologies that its Web site operates on," Sullivan said.

The company has more than 1 million existing subscribers to date and around 550 workers companywide, including nearly 450 in Provo.

"We're cautious about expansion this year, but we're continuing to hire workers as our business is still growing," he said.

Hochhauser replaces former chief financial officer David Rinn, who will lead the Provo company's newly-established strategy and corporate development group.

"We decided about six months ago that in the new year we wanted to focus more on corporate development and strategic partnerships including pursuing mergers and acquisition to grow the business. We determined Rinn would be good to lead this effort," Sullivan said.

Rinn, who has served as chief financial officer since June 2004 and managed the company's accounting, financial reporting, human resources and legal functions, will continue to report to Sullivan in his new role.

Prior to joining the Provo firm, Rinn spent 11 years at Microsoft Corp. Rinn, who holds a master's of business administration from The Anderson School at the University of California, Los Angeles and a bachelor's degree in geology from Vassar College in New York, has also worked in the investment banking division of Morgan Stanley.

Hochhauser has spent more than eight years at Martha Stewart Living including serving as chief financial officer since July 2006. He played a key role in determining the company's business strategy and capital allocation process and oversees administrative functions, including investor relations and corporate communications.

"Howard has been a valued and steady influence during his eight years at [the company], and his presence will be missed," said Charles Koppelman, Martha Stewart's executive chairman. "As CFO, Howard played a key role in guiding our steadily improving financial position as the company returned to profitability and growth under a more diversified media and merchandising business model."

From 1996 to 2000, Hochhauser was at Bear, Stearns & Co. in the equity research department where he served as vice president. He had also worked at Credit Suisse First Boston and KPMG Peat Marwick. Hochhauser, a certified public accountant, has a master's degree in business administration from Columbia University and a bachelor's degree in accounting from Boston University.