Clearwire taps Vodafone again for new-look management team

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Clearwire taps Vodafone again for new-look management team

By CAROLINE GABRIEL

Published: 1 September, 2009

READ MORE: People/Management | Clearwire | Vodafone

Clearwire continues to transform its management team to spearhead its transition from closely watched start-up to major carrier, and once again has tapped a former Vodafone executive for a key role.

Earlier this year, the WiMAX-based mobile broadband provider brought in Bill Morrow, a highly respected Vodafone veteran well used to the challenges of the tier one carrier market, to push Clearwire towards that tier one itself. The original management team, which had seen Clearwire through its merger with Sprint Xohm, took new roles, in a well-timed transition process. Now two of those early executives, chief strategy officer Scott Richardson and CFO David Sach, are leaving the firm. Richardson will continue to serve as an advisor, while Sach, who has been at Clearwire for less than a year, is to "pursue new opportunities". He will be replaced by Erik Prusch, most recently CFO of Borland Software and a former colleague of Morrow, who is clearly hand-picking his own team now.

Although the carrier has not directly replaced Richardson, it has brought in Teresa Elder, formerly CEO of Vodafone Ireland, to the new position of president of strategic partnerships and wholesale. She also has experience of the US market, and valuable contacts for her new role, via a former role as divisional president of AT&T Broadband (now part of Comcast). She will report to chief commercial offiver Mike Sievert and be part of Morrow's executive team.

Given that much of Clearwire's strategy, and its chances of making a serious impact on Verizon and AT&T, relies on wholesale and MVNO partners, this will be a critical role. It is essential that the WiMAX operator manages its existing, and powerful, MVNO deals effectively as its network starts to gain scale - Sprint Nextel, Comcast, Cox and Brighthouse Networks are all investors and the first three have started to launch their own offerings running on the Clearwire system. Elder will also, no doubt, be looking for additional partners, perhaps in emerging areas like machine-to-machine or embedded services (a market pioneered by Sprint with its Amazon Kindle deal).