NEW DELHI: Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson has appointed Ulf Ewaldsson as Senior Vice President, Chief Strategy and Technology Officer and Head of Group Function Strategy and Technology.
He has more than 20 years of experience in product management, industry development and customer relations, which has taken him to leadership positions at Ericsson in China, Japan, Hungary and Sweden.
Rima Qureshi was appointed Head of Region North America July 1, 2016, and has since held dual roles. In addition to her role as Head of Region North America, Rima Qureshi will continue to drive the strategic partnership with Cisco.
Both Ewaldsson and Qureshi will continue to be Executive Leadership Team members and report to Ericsson’s CEO.
Jan Frykhammar, President and CEO, Ericsson, says: “This move is a natural step as Rima focuses fully on driving the business development and customer relationships in one of the most advanced technology markets in the world. In the rapid technology development and transformation of our industry it makes perfect sense to combine technology strategy and strategy development into one process.”
Prior to this, Ewaldsson has been Chief Technology Officer and Head of Group Function Technology at Ericsson since February 1, 2012.
In this role, Ulf Ewaldsson is responsible for the development of future technologies as well as the company’s overall strategy. Ewaldsson is the chairman of Ericsson’s Research Board, a board member of the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, Ericsson-LG, and TM Forum. He is also executive board member of Assa Abloy.
He is involved in the European strategic work regarding ICT and Telecom taking part in the European Cloud Partnership Steering Board and the European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP SCC) headed by the European Commission in Brussels.
Because he is able to describe complex technology and industry evolution in simple, everyday terms, he has been a popular speaker at events such as Digitalisierung und Industrie 4.0 – Germany (with Angela Merkel), World Economic Forum, Mobile World Congress in both Barcelona and Shanghai, and Broadband World Forum.
Ewaldsson was Head of Product Area Radio at Ericsson Business Unit Networks from 2007 until 2012. In that position, he was instrumental in helping create some of the products that reflect Ericsson’s technology leadership, such as HSPA and LTE in the radio access network, the multi-standard RBS 6000, and the antenna-integrated radio unit.
Ewaldsson was born in Skåne in Sweden in 1965. He graduated with an MSc in Engineering and Business Management from Linköping Institute of Technology in Sweden.
See more on Voice & Data.