2009-11-06

New position in Ericsson Group Management Team to drive implementation of new brand strategy

Ericsson's in-coming President and CEO Hans Vestberg has appointed Cesare Avenia to a new position in the group management team where Avenia will be responsible for driving the implementation of Ericsson's new brand strategy. Cesare Avenia is presently head of market unit South East Europe and will take on his new position as Chief Brand Officer November 9, 2009.

Ericsson is the undisputed leading supplier in the telecom industry and has strengthened its position significantly in the 21st century. Fundamentals for the industry are positive, mainly driven by the growing demand for broadband and connectivity. Ericsson has over the past year developed a new brand strategy to leverage opportunities and meet challenges to come in the next few years. "We will move from traditional telecom to IP, we see how we move from being a hardware to a software business and we will see an evolution and modernization of the networks rather than the past years vast rollouts of new networks", says in-coming President and CEO Hans Vestberg. "This requires us to change our ways of working as well as business and engagement models. Our ability to develop competence, behavior and position are key success factors and we are repositioning our brand to capture these new opportunities."

The brand stands for a company's capabilities, strategic direction and differentiation from competition. It shows the direction to the market and its employees.
"Our brand must not only speak about our ambitions, but drive our ambitions", says Cesare Avenia. "My role will be to build confidence and help facilitate change in the organization. I will focus on guiding our colleagues in this transformation to secure long-term value growth."

Hans Vestberg says; "Cesare's experience from many part of Ericsson and deep knowledge of our customer needs makes him well suited to head this important task. He has an inspiring management style and I look forward to welcoming him in our Group Management Team."

Cesare Avenia joined Ericsson in 1994 when he was appointed marketing manager for division Mobile Systems. In parallel, he has been teaching industrial marketing at the University of Tor Vergata in Rome. During the years with Ericsson he has hold different managerial positions, like head of Division Switching and Network Systems in Italy, head of Region Middle East and Africa, head of market unit Middle East and in 2003 he was appointed head of Ericsson Italy. Since 2006, he is head of market unit South East Europe and member of the extended group management team.

Cesare Avenia was born in 1950 in S. Maria Capua Vetere in Italy. He has a degree in Electronics Engineering. He is married and has two children.

Information about the company: Telefon AB LM Ericsson