Safaricom CEO takes over firm’s marketing
Safaricom’s chief executive will personally oversee the marketing function in a fresh reorganisation of the firm’s executive suit, after exit of the department’s director.
Mr Maurice Newa, a Malawian, resigned last week as the company’s director of customer care and strategic marketing, just eight months after he took up the position in August 2011.
“Maurice has left for personal reasons. He used to report to Mr Peter Arina (general manager consumer business unit). But I will now take a more hands-on approach in the marketing arena,” the chief executive Bob Collymore told the Daily Nation in an interview on the sidelines of the Connected Kenya Summit 2012 in Mombasa.
It is not clear why the firm made this latest reorganisation, but it seems aimed at giving management a firmer grip on the department, which has been a key driver of its business.
Since he took charge, Mr Collymore has been re-engineering top level management, merging some departments and creating others as he seeks to get the right mix to push the firm through an increasingly competitive environment.
The firm’s products have mostly been marketed in sheng and the marketing strategy largely developed around Kenya’s cultural and physical attributes. It is, therefore, necessary that the person in charge of the department understands the local market.
The firm announced at the ICT summit that it will double its broadband capacity to 42 mega bits per second from the current 21mbs, a month after its main rival Airtel launched a 3G network.
