International Business Machines (IBM) has named Arvind Krishna as the chief executive officer (CEO).
Arvind Krishna is currently IBM Senior Vice President for Cloud and Cognitive Software, and was a principal architect of the company’s acquisition of Red Hat. Arvind Krishna has grown IBM’s Cloud and Cognitive Software business and led the largest acquisition in the company’s history.
James Whitehurst, IBM Senior Vice President and CEO of Red Hat, will become the IBM President.
Achievement of Virginia Rometty
Virginia Rometty, IBM Chairman, president and chief executive officer, will continue as executive chairman of the Board and will retire at the end of the year after almost 40 years with the company.
Virginia Rometty, 62, became chairman, president and chief executive officer of IBM in 2012. She made bold changes to reposition IBM for the future, investing in high value segments of the IT market and optimizing the company’s portfolio.
IBM acquired 65 companies, built out key capabilities in hybrid cloud, security, industry and data, and AI both organically and inorganically, and completed one of the largest technology acquisitions in history.
She has reinvented more than 50 percent of IBM’s portfolio, built $21 billion hybrid cloud business and established IBM’s leadership in AI, quantum computing and blockchain, while divesting nearly $9 billion in annual revenue to focus the portfolio on IBM’s high value, integrated offerings.
“I am looking forward to working with IBMers, Red Hatters and clients around the world at this unique time of fast-paced change in the IT industry. Jim will be a great partner in the next step of this journey,” Arvind Krishna said.
Profile of Arvind Krishna
Krishna, 57, is IBM Senior Vice President for Cloud and Cognitive Software, where he leads the IBM business unit that provides the cloud and data platform on which IBM’s clients build the future. His current responsibilities include the IBM Cloud, IBM Security and Cognitive Applications business, and IBM Research. Previously, he was general manager of IBM’s Systems and Technology Group’s development and manufacturing organization.
Prior to that he built and led many of IBM’s data-related businesses. He has an undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and a PhD. in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He joined IBM in 1990.
Whitehurst, 52, is IBM Senior Vice President and CEO of Red Hat, which was acquired by IBM in 2019. During his tenure at Red Hat, revenue grew over eight times.
Here’s a list of few global CEOs of Indian origin: Sundar Pichai of Google; Satya Nadella of Microsoft; Shantanu Narayen of Adobe; Rajeev Suri of Nokia; Jayshree Ullal at Arista Networks; Francisco D’Souza at Cognizant; Dinesh Paliwal at Harman International and Sanjay Mehrotra at Micron Technology.
