Word got out yesterday that Parature — an on-demand customer service vendor and 2009 CRM magazine Service Rising Star — changed the captain of its ship, officially naming Tim Davenport as its new chief executive officer.

Davenport most recently served as president of Revolution Health Network. Preceding that position, he was the CEO of Vastera, which was acquired by JP Morgan Chase in 2005. Prior to that, he served as CEO of Best Software, where he oversaw the company’s initial public offering in 1997 as well as its purchase by the Sage Group plc in 2000.

Duke Chung, former CEO and founder of Parature, will be responsible for thought leadership, corporate development, acquisitions, international expansion, new products, partnerships and channels, and “represent the face of the company across key industry events worldwide,” according to a statement released by Parature.

“Tim’s leadership skills and extensive experience in the software industry make him the perfect fit to help guide us through this next phase of expansion,” Chung said in the company statement. “His valuable insight and remarkable management experience will further distinguish us as one of the fastest growing software companies in North America.”

So for a company seemingly on the growth fast-track, why change chief executives now? “We grew 63.2 percent last year, and we had 40 percent growth in the first half of this year over last year [in the] first half,” wrote Gary McNeil, vice president of marketing at Parature, in an email message. “Duke wanted to bring on a CEO that will help us with all aspects of the business so that [he] can work on strategic partnerships, channels, international expansion, and other aspects of the business.  Duke just turned 31, and he has accomplished so much at such a young age that he was looking for someone who has done this before.”

This marks the second 2009 CRM Service Rising Star to switch CEOs in the past year — Helpstream quietly switched from Anthony Nemelka to Robert Warfield in early June. In May, SugarCRM co-founder and former CEO John Roberts resigned, with Larry Augustin taking the role of interim CEO. (According to the open-source pioneer’s executive biography Web page, the “interim” title has been dropped.)

It is unclear yet — since all of these moves occurred within the past several months — just how they will work out, but what does this say about the CRM market as a whole? With the economy rapidly changing, customers increasingly demanding, and technology constantly forcing companies to innovate, can we expect more of these c-level executive moves?