NTT marketing chief takes the CEO's post for A/NZ

Tania Balcombe

Global tech services giant, NTT, has promoted its local chief marketing officer to the top A/NZ job following the retirement of its long-serving chief.

Tania Balcombe will take over the reins as chief executive officer from Steve Nola, who is retiring from the group after a 31-year tenure. Both Balcombe and Nola are longstanding employees of Dimension Data, which was acquired by NTT and rebranded under the NTT masthead last year as part of a significant rebranding program orchestrated by the group globally.

Balcombe comes to the top job with 14 years’ experience across the organisation. Most recently, she was chief marketing officer and go-to-market officer for NTT in Australia. She’s also held various other roles across the group such as general manager for part of the Australian business, which saw her in charge of new business plans for the Victorian region.

In a statement, NTT said Balcombe was well known and regarded by clients across the region for her work on strategic projects as well relationships with partners.

Confirmation of the new local CEO comes as NTT confirmed its plans to unite the Australian and New Zealand businesses into one A/NZ region from 1 October, a move which is also expected to better align local business into wider Asia-Pacific operations.

The changes are positioned as a way of improving the way the group’s 1400 clients in the region and is another step in NTT’s efforts to unify what was previously a disparate set of 28 companies into one branded whole globally.

On 1 July 2019, NTT officially unified the capabilities of its owned 28 companies, including Dimension Data, NTT Communications and Arkadin, under one brand, creating an $11 billion London-based business with 40,000 staff in 73 countries and territories. The ambition is to make NTT one of the world’s top 20 brands, alongside other shining technology brands like Cisco and Oracle.

In October, NTT’s rebrand launched across all countries, with executive teams announced at the same time. Nola, who sat in the NTT CEO seat for Australia, announced his plans to retire in May this year, with his final day set as 30 September 2020.

“As part of our ongoing focus to transform our business, we’ve been reviewing how we can be faster to market, better serve our clients, align to our industry priorities and increase career opportunities for our people. The changes we have decided to make position NTT as the strongest technology services company in Asia-Pacific,” NTT global chief executive officer, Jason Goodall, said.

“I am also delighted to appoint Tania, who is a world-class leader and a great advocate for our clients, partners and people across A/NZ.”

NTT’s portfolio of services covers security, data centres, networks, collaboration, managed services and systems integration.

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