Vodafone lands Microsoft executive for business role

By Victoria Young

Aug. 13 (BusinessDesk) - Vodafone New Zealand boss Jason Paris has made a key appointment to the telco’s executive team, snaring Microsoft executive Lindsay Zwart.

Heading up the division which sells products to businesses, as opposed to individual consumers, Zwart returns to New Zealand after five years in the United States. She was most recently the general manager of Microsoft’s cloud and enterprise business.

Her appointment comes as Infratil and Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management officially took over as owners at the start of the month, and following the company’s ambitious announcement to switch on a 5G network in major centres by the end of the year.

Zwart will start in September, replacing Ken Tunnicliffe who has already left the business after 15 years.

The move follows last September's appointment of consumer director Carolyn Luey from MYOB, and the arrival this year of new external communications Richard Llewellyn, a former Spark executive who moved to Vodafone from Vector.

Paris said Zwart’s deep experience in the cloud and digital transformation will be a huge benefit to the business.

“Lindsay has driven significant growth for Microsoft, maintaining a strong focus on culture, empowering people through trust and accountability within multi-billion dollar departments,” he said in a statement.

Zwart had worked for Microsoft and IBM in New Zealand before she was posted to Seattle in 2013.

Vodafone’s first four partners for 5G will be the Police, BNZ, Waste Management and Auckland’s Rescue Helicopter. The company’s technology partners are Nokia, Microsoft and IBM.

(BusinessDesk)

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