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The 50 CFOs to watch in 2012
22 February 2012
The rollcall of CFOs in telecoms service providers is changing rapidly. Of the 50 CFOs to watch in this year’s GTB list, at least 14 have just been appointed, and some have not yet taken up their roles. All need to help change the perception of the industry among investors
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This is our second annual survey of the 50 CFOs to watch in the telecoms industry. As last year, the list is restricted to the CFOs of telecoms operators only — not vendors.
We’ve long acknowledged the importance of CFOs in determining the strategy of telecoms service providers. They have a particular task at the moment, as a debate rages within the industry over whether operators should be smart utilities (or “dumb pipes” as some call them) or full-range applications and cloud service providers.
It’s a highly capital intensive industry, and some prefer the less risky utility option; others though see service providers as competing with the media and IT industries — but have to raise capital in their less certain world.
We’ve picked 50 to watch, and added biographies of a selection. There has been quite a change in the list since 2011 — perhaps, given the state of the industry, change is always expected, but we have included 14 recent or new appointments among the 50.
There are a lot more than 50 excellent CFOs in the industry, among the many hundreds of companies that are providing services in the nearly 200 countries in the world.
This selection is not by market capitalisation or by sales or by number of companies. But we believe that they are 50 CFOs that all in the industry should watch as they play an increasingly important role in taking the industry into its next stage.
As last year we thank WeDo Technologies for supporting this special report; as last year WeDo had no role in choosing or approving the selection: that was entirely the responsibility of Global Telecoms Business.
The 50 CFOs in telecoms to watch
América Móvil Carlos José Garcia Moreno Elizondo
AT&T John Stephens
Bouygues Philippe Marien
BT Tony Chanmugam
China Mobile Xue Taohai
China Telecom Wu Andi
China Unicom Li Fushen
City Telecom Hong Kong Ni Quiaque Lai
Clearwire Hope Cochran
Colt Mark Ferrari
Cox Communications Mark Bowser
Deutsche Telekom Timotheus Höttges
Digicel Lawrence Hickey
Elisa Jari Kinnunen
Everything Everywhere Neal Milsom
Etisalat Serkan Okandan
France Telecom Orange Gervais Pellissier
Iliad Thomas Reynaud
Interoute Catherine Birkett
KPN Eric Hageman
Level 3 Sunit Patel
LightSquared Marc Montagner
MTNL Anita Soni
Ncell Tommi Holopainen
NTT Toshio Kobayashi
NTT DoCoMo Kazuto Tsubouchi
Ono Carlos Sagasta
PCCW Susanna Hui
Reliance Communications Udayan Maroo
Rogers Anthony Staffieri
Rostelecom Anton Khozyainov
Safaricom John Tombleson
SFR Pierre Trotot
Singapore Telecom Ngiap Jong (Jeann) Low
SoftBank BB Kazuhiko Fujihara
Sprint Joseph Euteneuer
Tata Communications Sanjay Baweja
Telecom New Zealand Nick Olson
Telefónica Ángel Vilá
Telekom Austria Hans Tschuden
Telkom South Africa Jacques Schindehütte
Telmex Carlos Robles Miaja
Telstra Andrew Penn
Verizon Francis Shammo
Verizon Wireless Andrew Davies
VimpelCom Henk van Dalen
Virgin Media Eamonn O’Hare
Vivendi Philippe Capron
Vodacom Ivan Dittrich
Vodafone Andrew Halford
New guard of CFOs come into telecoms
business from insurance, finance and IT
Research and feature by Priscilla Awde
Something of a new broom is sweeping through the ranks of CFOs. Within the last eight to 12 months at least 14 telcos have swapped the old for the new with some already in post while others take up their positions later in 2012. There seems no particular reason beyond cyclical change although the current economy may encourage introducing new ideas and perspectives.
Some outgoing executives are moving to new companies and others are retiring. Of the new guard, most have previous experience in telecoms or IT but others are new to the industry coming from insurance or finance companies bringing with them different experiences and ways of working.
The industry is losing one of the few women CFOs but gaining another. KPN’s Carla Smits-Nusteling resigned, publicly disagreeing with the direction the company has taken. Meanwhile, Hope Cochran has taken over at Clearwire as one of the incoming CFOs.
Jean-Claude Delcroix, vice president of research for Gartner, is not especially surprised at the turnaround, estimating the average term of office is between five to seven years — with about 20% moving annually.
Changing perceptions
However some changes may be driven by the need for wider experience and multiple skills beyond traditional CFO capabilities. “The main long-term investors are from insurance companies, so it makes sense to have CFOs who understand this market. The principle role of CFOs is to change the perception of telecoms in the mindset of investors and show this is not purely a utility sector but offers advanced IT and entertainment services,” says Delcroix.
“Most operators have problems raising capital and live with high debt, which markets don’t like. Although telecoms is considered a safe haven, it lacks visibility of long term profitability so CFOs must deliver this message, show strategies and growth vision. It is a big task to drive the vision of cost effective growth and show stakeholders the value of that.”
Justifying investments
Today’s CFOs must rise to new challenges in what is an increasingly important role in trying economic times. Sergio Silvestre, chief marketing officer and vice president at WeDo Technologies, believes: “CFOs are more influential and are asking operational teams to justify investments and evaluate benefits.”
More is needed of the executive number twos beyond crunching numbers and managing the books. They are helping devise and drive corporate strategy and productivity improvements and are more proactive and visible within and outside telcos. CFOs marry financial rigour with the communications skills more usually associated with CEOs.
“CFOs look at the business end-to-end, focus on creative involvement, balancing cost, risk, profit and efficiency. They are more actively involved in business and contract negotiations and re-negotiations and devising new ways of partnering with suppliers, encouraging them to take on more risk and creating differentiated payment for value added to customers and their organisations,” explains Joe Gallagher, head of telecoms at KPMG.
Balancing investment with cost cutting while supporting efficiency and productivity without increasing headcounts is a perennial problem. Delcroix agrees that during 2012 CFOs must implement another round of savings on top of those already achieved, but cannot risk reducing capex too much. “The task is to fund new initiatives in different ways — work in partnership and shift the burden of investment to partners but this is a dangerous game risking loss of control,” he believes.
Opportunities to buy
The rapidly changing global economy puts added pressure on CFOs to react fast to protect from sudden negative shifts and take advantage of opportunities where they arise. Opportunities are there to buy struggling companies or operations sold off by competitors, thereby adding either capabilities and technologies or enhancing and increasing share or profitability in important markets.
Savvy, fleet footed CFOs can quickly take advantage of the growing trend towards consolidation. Telcos are selling minority owned assets to increase control over what they own. Larger operators with the money to expand will be selective, but smaller companies will find it harder to compete.
There will be more diversification and buy versus build acquisitions as telcos become one-stop-shops delivering a whole suite of communications products to businesses and consumers.
Sunit Patel, CFO at Level 3, believes that, while people are unsure about which direction the economy will go, “the economic environment is more stable now than in the financial crisis of the late 1980s [and] early 1990s”. In America, the environment “is slowly recovering”, says Patel.
“Raising capital in very volatile conditions means CFOs must be particularly good at getting in and out of markets which change daily. It’s important to allocate capital to the right opportunities and ensure it’s not being targeted to areas with sub-par returns. We must know the financial implications of everything pretty quickly and be innovative in terms of sourcing and driving productivity and efficiency improvement. We must simultaneously keep a close eye on costs while ensuring the business is executing well from a top-line perspective.”
Currency fluctuations
Today’s currency fluctuations do cause major headaches and may have a significant impact on the bottom line as contracts negotiated in one currency rise or fall in value.
However used CFOs are to managing such risk, the differences now are volatility and the speed of change. Close monitoring and reporting of revenues and expenses by currency show where net exposure is; fast reactions are required to reduce that exposure while exploiting M&A possibilities.
CFOs in mature markets may learn a few lessons from those based in developing economies where managing currency instability is a routine fact of business life along with low GDPs and revenue, slim profits and margins, and regulations not as rigorous or transparent as elsewhere.
“Currency issues are more acute now due to uncertainty and local currencies pegged to sterling, the dollar or euro. Operators need to plan the business around fluctuations which requires careful managing,” explains Digicel’s CFO Lawrence Hickey.
“There are two stories: western world versus developing markets which are growing fast and aggressively.”
Telecoms is a fairly robust industry, says Hickey. “People in developing countries are getting rid of fixed phones in favour of mobiles which are the last things to go in terms of consumer spend. CFOs must be in the forefront of the business and a key decision maker. Their credibility must be high, they must articulate plans clearly, show results and road maps and roll with the changes.” GTB
14 new appointments
John Stephens
AT&T
Appointed CFO in June 2011, John Stephens was previously the company’s senior vice president and controller. Throughout his 19-year career at AT&T, he has held a number of finance positions within the company and its subsidiaries.
Li Fushen
China Unicom
Appointed CFO March 2011 Li Fushen, was previously company senior vice president. He moved to China Unicom from Netcom where he had held several C-level positions including CFO. With a master’s degree in management and a degree in engineering management, Li has worked in the telecoms industry since 2001. He has also served as a non-executive director at Hong Kong’s PCCW since 2007.
Hope Cochran
Clearwire
Hope Cochran has moved into the CFO position from company senior VP finance and treasurer. Previously was CFO at planning and logistics company Evant. She has also held posts in PeopleSoft — sold to Oracle — and was founder and CFO of SkillsVillage before it was sold to PeopleSoft. Having graduated in economics and music from Stanford University, Cochran’s career started at Deloitte & Touche.
Neal Milsom
Everything Everywhere
Neal Milsom moved to Everything Everywhere — the UK joint venture of France Telecom Orange and Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile — as vice president of finance from Orange UK where he held the same position for over five years. Past positions include divisional financial director at Unipart Group and a finance role at 3i. As a chartered accountant, he started his training at Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
Serkan Okandan
Etisalat
Serkan Okandan joined the company from a similar position at Turkcell where he was also acting CEO for its Ukrainian operations. Before becoming group CFO, he was group financial controller and led Turkcell’s reporting division. He started his career at Pricewaterhouse Coopers in 1992 and worked as financial controller for DHL and Frito Lay, joining Turkcell in 2000. He graduated from Bosphorus University in economics and administrative sciences.
Eric Hageman
KPN
Eric Hageman has moved from CEO of KPN in Belgium, a post he had held since only June 2011, having previously been CFO of KPN Mobile International where he was responsible for acquisitions and investor relations. Before joining KPN he was a financial advisor at Deutsche Bank and ABN Amro in London. He has an MBA from the London Business School.
Anthony Staffieri
Rogers
Starting in April 2012, Anthony Staffieri becomes CFO of Rogers, moving from BCE — owner of Bell Canada — where he was senior VP of finance for the wireless and wireline businesses. He has also served as CFO of the Americas for Celectica and was a senior partner at Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
John Tombleson
Safaricom
New Zealander John Tombleson was acting CEO and CFO at Vodafone Qatar before joining Safaricom in Kenya. He is an original member of the Qatar start-up team and helped build a 48% market share within two years. He first joined Vodafone in his home country and has since held senior financial roles in mobile and fixed telecoms.
Joseph Euteneuer
Sprint
Joseph Euteneuer was appointed in April 2011 from executive vice president and CFO of Qwest, which was then being taken over by CenturyLink. Before that he held similar positions at XM Satellite Radio Holdings and worked in management positions at Comcast and its subsidiary Broadnet Europe. He is a certified public accountant with an accounting degree from Arizona State University.
Ángel Vilá
Telefónica
Ángel Vilá joined Telefónica in 1997 as group controller, rising to CFO of Telefónica Internacional, before becoming corporate CFO and development officer in September 2011. As group head of corporate development he executed corporate acquisitions of UK-based O2 and Brazil’s Brasilcel/Vivo among others. Before joining Telefónica, he worked at Citigroup, McKinsey, Ferrovial and Planeta. He has an MBA from Columbia University.
Jacques Schindehutte
Telkom South Africa
Jacques Schindehutte became CFO in August 2011, having moved from his position as group financial director of the Absa group. He has also held financial positions in Transnet, Portnet and SA Transport Services and has served on the board of directors of several companies.
Carlos Robles Miaja
Telmex
Carlos Robles Miaja joined Telmex in 2005 and moved from vice president of budgets and financial evaluation to CFO in August 2012.
Andrew Penn
Telstra
Starting as Telstra CFO in March 2012, Andrew Penn is moving to Telstra from his position as group CEO for AXA Asia Pacific where he worked for 20 years in a number of senior financial, strategic and executive roles. He moved to Australia in 1992 from London where he worked for transport company P&O. In addition to business activities, he has executive positions on a number of not not-for-profit and community organisations.
Ivan Dittrich
Vodacom
Ivan Dittrich will join South African mobile operator Vodacom as CFO in July from a similar position at IT group Datatec — which owns telecoms consultancy Analysys Mason — and he has held a number of executive positions at Datatec. Before that, he worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers in London and Deloitte in South Africa.
Eight from Asia and the Pacific
Wu Andi
China Telecom
Wu Andi is a graduate of the Beijing Institute of Economics. She is a senior accountant with 23 years of financial experience in the telecommunications industry in China. Wu has been CFO of China Telecom since 2000.
Tommi Holopainen
Ncell
Tommi Holopainen became CFO for Ncell in Nepal in 2009. He made the move from parent company TelisSonera which he joined in 1995 working in Finland, Germany, Russia and in head office finance in Sweden on various M&A activities and business strategy. He has an MSc in economics and an eMBA.
Toshio Kobayashi
NTT
Toshio Kobayashi has been manager of finance unit in NTT since 2007. He is director and senior vice president, director of finance and the accounting department, and is president of NTT Capital (UK). He joined the Japan’s Ministry of Finance in April 1975 and in July 2006 became its deputy director-general for policy evaluation. He joined NTT in his present role in June 2007.
Kazuto Tsubouchi
NTT DoCoMo
Kazuto Tsubouchi is executive vice president, CFO and a member of board of directors at NTT DoCoMo, and managing director of the accounts and finance department. He joined parent company NTT in 1976 after graduating from the
University of Tokyo with a bachelor’s degree in law. In 2000 he became general manager of NTT’s Kanazawa branch (NTT West), a regional fixed-telecommunications carrier. He joined NTT DoCoMo as managing director of the accounts and finance department at NTT DoCoMo Kansai in June 2004.
Susanna Hui
PCCW
Susanna Hui has been the group chief financial officer of PCCW since April 2007 and was appointed an executive director of the Hong Kong company in May 2010. She was earlier director of finance, with responsibility for the telecommunications services sector and regulatory accounting. Before joining Hong Kong Telecommunications — which was subsequently acquired by PCCW — in September 1999, Hui was the CFO of a listed company engaged in hotel and property investment and management. She has a bachelor’s degree in social sciences from the University of Hong Kong.
Ngiap Jong (Jeann) Low
Singapore Telecom
Jeann Low has been group CFO of SingTel since 2008 after two years as CFO at SingTel’s Australian subsidiary Optus. Before that she was executive VP for strategic investments, managing international investment opportunities and projects. Low joined SingTel in 1998 after posts with an international accounting company in London and Singapore. She is a graduate in accountancy from the National University of Singapore.
Kazuhiko Fujihara
SoftBank BB
Kazuhiko Fujihara is chief technology officer of Softbank Telecom but also CFO and senior vice president of Softbank BB, the broadband part of the group, and of Softbank Mobile — formerly Vodafone Japan. He has been a director of Softbank Telecom — formerly known as Japan Telecom — since May 2009.
Nick Olson
Telecom New Zealand
Nick Olson was appointed CFO of Telecom New Zealand in autumn 2010, at the beginning of the process — now complete — of splitting the company from its former infrastructure subsidiary Chorus. He has over 20 years’ experience in finance and investment banking. Before rising to CFO, he held senior positions within the company including treasurer. He has experience in capital markets and M&As. He has an engineering degree from the University of Auckland and is an Associate Chartered Accountant.
Six from the Americas
Carlos Jose Garcia Moreno Elizondo
América Móvil
Carlos Jose Garcia Moreno Elizondo has been the CFO since 2001, before which he was the general director of public credit at the Mexican Ministry of Finance and Public Credit. He has also been the managing director of UBS Warburg and was associate director of finance of Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex).
Mark Bowser
Cox Communications
Mark Bowser’s 30 years experience includes a number of senior level financial positions at Fortune 500 companies. He joined Cox in 2006 as VP of Cox Business from his post as VP of large corporate accounts at Dell’s business division. He started his career with the FBI, moving into telecoms at GTE and then Sprint where he was president of the enterprise markets division and senior VP of business sales. He has a degree in finance and accounting from Pennsylvania Sate University.
Marc Montagner
LightSquared
Marc Montagner joined the company from Dupont Circle Partners where he was a managing partner. Having started his telecoms career at France Telecom, his previous experience includes a post as executive VP for Sky Terra working on regulatory, technical and business issues. He has also been MD and co-head of the Global Telcom, Media and Technology Merger and Acquisition Group of Banc of America Securities; a senior VP responsible for M&As at Sprint Nextel and telecoms and media group MD at Morgan Stanley.
Sunit Patel
Level 3
Sunit Patel was appointed Level 3’s CFO in 2003 from the same position at Looking Glass Networks of which he was also co-founder. Before that, he was treasurer of MCI WorldCom and of MFS Communications prior to its acquisition by WorldCom.
At Level 3 he has seen a huge expansion of the company in 2011 with the agreed takeover of Global Crossing, which brought in Singapore Technologies Telemedia as the biggest shareholder.
Francis Shammo
Verizon
Francis Shammo was president and CFO of Verizon Business before becoming CFO of the Verizon group in November 2010. He has extensive experience in senior positions throughout Verizon.
Shammo joined Bell Atlantic Mobile in 1989 as general manager for accounting operations. He was later president of the west area of Verizon Wireless, responsible for the company’s operations in the 13 states of the US west of Colorado. He was vice president and controller at the time of Verizon Wireless’s launch.
Andrew Davies
Verizon Wireless
Vodafone executive Andrew Davis was announced as the new CFO of Verizon Wireless in September 2010, continuing a long tradition of Vodafone providing the CFOs of the US mobile company in which it holds a 45% stake. Previously Davies was CFO of Indian operation Vodafone Essar. He joined Vodafone in 2003 and held financial positions throughout the group including CFO of Vodafone Turkey, finance director for Vodafone Japan, and head of finance for the consumer business unit within Vodafone UK.
Thirteen from Europe
Philippe Marien
Bouygues Group
Philippe Marien has been CFO of Bouygues Group since 2007 and was appointed chairman of Bouygues Telecom’s board of directors in 2009. He joined the Bouygues Group in 1980 and has considerable executive finance experience which includes responsibility for managing corporate takeovers. He was finance director of Bouygues Offshore and CFO of Bouygues Batiment and of the Saur group where he oversaw its sale.
Mark Ferrari
Colt
Appointed CFO of Colt in March 2011 from his position as non-executive director, Mark Ferrari was MD of Devonshire Investors and has held executive positions on several companies. Before joining Fidelity, the major shareholder in Colt, he was VP of finance at Kronos. He started his career at Ernst & Young.
Timotheus Höttges
Deutsche Telekom
Timotheus Höttges has been a member of the board of management of Deutsche Telekom AG responsible for finance and controlling since March 2009. He studied business administration at Cologne University and later played a central role in the merger of Viag and Veba to form power company E.on. He joined T-Mobile International becoming chairman of its management board in 2004 and heading its European operations. From December 2006 he was the group board of management member responsible for Deutsche Telekom’s domestic fixed network and broadband unit, T-Home.
Jari Kinnunen
Elisa
Jari Kinnunen was appointed CFO of Finnish operator Elisa in 2005 from his position as VP for business development. Before that, he was president and CEO at Yomi and CFO at Elisa Kommunikation in Germany. Previous experience includes MD of Polar International and controller in Alftan. He has an MSc in economics and business administration.
Gervais Pellissier
France Telecom Orange
Gervais Pellissier has been deputy CEO and head of group finance and information systems since 2010. He also heads the joint venture with T-Mobile UK. Pellissier joined the company from his post as managing director and deputy CEO of It company Groupe Bull and then oversaw the integration of France Telecom’s Spanish businesses.
Thomas Reynaud
Iliad
Thomas Reynaud joined French operator Iliad in 2007 becoming CFO in 2008. He moved to Iliad from Société Générale where he was an MD in equity capital markets responsible for the Telecoms, Media and Technology sector. Working in both Paris and New York he led a number of IPOs, privatisations and equity and debt offerings and worked with Iliad. He graduated from HEC and New York University.
Catherine Birkett
Interoute
Catherine Birkett joined Interoute in 2000 and became CFO at the end of 2005. She has helped restructure the group, complete several acquisitions and drive high growth. She worked for KPMG Transaction Services on financial and commercial due diligence and is a qualified chartered accountant. Birkett has a degree in maths and economics from Durham University.
Carlos Sagasta
Ono
Carlos Sagasta previously served as board member and finance planning and control director for Spanish operator Abertis Telecom. He has also been on the board of directors at Hispasat and Eutelsat.
Anton Khozyainov
Rostelecom
Anton Khozyainov previously worked as an advisor to the general director of MT’s NTT and then as finance director of Marshall Capital and before that for RT Group. He was director of the National Telecommunications Group of Companies until January this year and has served as a member of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants. He has a degree from the Moscow Electronics and Mathematics Institute in applied mathematics and is a qualified engineer mathematician.
Pierre Trotot
SFR
Pierre Trotot began his career at Arthur Anderson moving to Compagnie de Navitgation Mixte and Compagnie Generale des Eaux before joining SFR in 1997. He is also director of finance at Neuf Cegetel and is a member of Audit Committee of Maroc Telecom. He is a graduate of Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC).
Hans Tschuden
Telekom Austria
Hans Tschuden has been CFO at Telekom Austria since 2007. He moved to the company from the same position at Wienerberger having joined that group in 1989 where he worked in a number of executive positions. He graduated from the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration and the International Executive Program in Paris.
Henk van Dalen
VimpelCom
Cornelius Henk van Dalen joined VimpelCom as CFO in September 2010, and has overseen the 2011 takeover of Orascom’s Wind Telecom assets. Van Dalen was previously CFO and a member of the board of TNT, the Dutch delivery service. He had previously spent 30 years at DSM, a Dutch health, nutrition and materials company.
Eamonn O’Hare
Virgin Media
Appointed CFO of Virgin Media in 2009, Eamonn O’Hare previously worked in the same position for a British retail subsidiary of Tesco and for telecoms operator Energis Communications. He has held several senior international finance and management positions for PepsiCo.