Spark announces new emerging technologies entity

MARKET RELEASE 22 November 2018 Spark New Zealand announces new emerging technologies entity, leadership squad changes Spark New Zealand has announced today that Dr Claire Barber will take on a new role with Spark to establish and become CEO of a new subsidiary business entity that will focus on long-term, large-scale new business opportunities arising from a range of emerging technologies. As this entity will operate distinct from Spark's core business, effective 31 December 2018 she will vacate her current role as Product Director on Spark's leadership squad. Effective 1 February 2019, Tessa Tierney, currently tribe lead for Managed Data at Spark, will be promoted to Product Director and as such she will join the leadership squad. Managing Director Simon Moutter commented: "Over recent years, Claire has played a critical role in leading the almost total transformation of Spark's IT stack and digital experience capabilities - something few other major telcos have been able to achieve - meaning we are now in a position to leverage this new capability in ways that simply would not have been possible a couple of years ago. "Having completed this transformation, I have asked Claire to step away from her day-to-day responsibilities as a member of the Leadership Squad, and set up and lead the development of a new business entity, reporting directly to me, to address similarly transformative opportunities arising from technologies such as blockchain, self-sovereign identity (SSI), artificial intelligence (AI), cross reality (XR), and hyperscale / edge computing. "Claire will move across to establish this new business - which we have yet to name - from February 2019. While we have yet to confirm resource and people commitments, she will start with a small, focused team and build from there." Tessa Tierney joined Spark three years ago firstly working in senior business sales and marketing roles after previously having had leadership roles at Vodafone and in the not-for-profit sector. In late 2017, she became lead of one of Spark's "frontrunner tribes" that laid the pathway for Spark's company-wide transformation to Agile at scale from July 2018. Simon Moutter commented: "Throughout our Agile journey, Tessa has been an avid supporter of Agile and her contribution has been outstanding. She now ranks as one of Spark's most experienced Agile practitioners and, importantly, that experience is focused around product development - which is very much at the centre of Spark's Agile operating model. Her promotion is well-deserved and I'm particularly pleased that this represents another demonstration of how our new Agile operating model encourages Spark's internal talent to be recognised and flourish." With effect 1 February 2019, Spark's full leadership squad line-up will be as follows: Managing Director Simon Moutter Customer Director Jolie Hodson Finance Director (CFO) David Chalmers General Counsel Melissa Anastasiou HR Director Joe McCollum Marketing Director Matt Bain Product Director Tessa Tierney Technology Director Mark Beder - ENDS - For media queries, please contact: Andrew Pirie Lead, Corporate Relations +64 (0) 27 555 0275 For investor relations queries, please contact: Dean Werder Finance Lead Partner, Product and Performance +64 (0) 27 259 7176 End CA:00327247 For:SPK Type:GENERAL Time:2018-11-22 15:28:34