Avnet Appoints New Chief Information Officer
PHOENIX -- Avnet, Inc. (NYSE:AVT) has named Steve Phillips as senior vice president and chief information officer, replacing and reporting to Ed Kamins, who has moved into the role of chief operational excellence officer.
Phillips came to Avnet with the July 2005 acquisition of Memec, where he had served as senior vice president and chief information officer since May 2004. Prior to joining Memec Phillips was senior vice president and chief information officer for Gateway Inc. He joined Gateway in 1999 and served as vice president of information technology (IT) in London and San Diego before his appointment in 2003 as CIO. Between 1996 and 1999, Phillips worked for Diageo, the international food and drinks group, where he was IT director for its European foods division. Prior to that, he spent eight years in a variety of leadership roles at Thorn EMI, a UK defense-electronics company. Phillips holds a BSc (Hons) in Electronic Engineering from Essex University and a post-graduate Diploma in Management Studies from Thames Valley University. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Electrical Engineers.
'As part of Avnet's acquisition strategy, we have developed a 'best people, best practices' process. If an individual from the acquired company proves to possess the right skills, attributes and experience for a position, that person will be appointed to the post,' said Kamins. 'Steve Phillips clearly is the right person to become Avnet's CIO and I am delighted to turn over the reins to Steve as I turn my focus toward our operational excellence program. Leveraging our industry leadership position, driving continuous improvement and creating sustainable competitive advantage for Avnet will take a collaborative effort between our business leaders, our process leaders and our IT experts.'
'I am delighted to be joining this highly accomplished group,' Phillips said. 'I plan to continue the progress made by Ed in establishing IT as a competitive differentiator for Avnet, with technology being used to improve customer service, enhance productivity, and support innovation -- both for Avnet and for its trading partners.'
In 2004, Avnet's IT team was recognized as #3 in the InformationWeek500 and #4 in the InfoWorld100 achievement awards.
About Avnet
Avnet (NYSE:AVT) enables success from the center of the technology industry, providing cost-effective services and solutions vital to a broad base of more than 100,000 customers and 300 suppliers. The company markets, distributes and adds value to a wide variety of electronic components, enterprise computer products and embedded subsystems. Through its premier market position, Avnet brings a breadth and depth of capabilities that help its trading partners accelerate growth and realize cost efficiencies. Avnet and Memec generated combined revenue in excess of $13 billion in the past year through sales in 69 countries. Visit www.avnet.com/
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