Swedish kit vendor Ericsson opted to draw on in-house talent to fill the vacancy left by the departure of Helena Norrman.

Ericsson’s new Head of Marketing & Corporate Relations is Stella Medlicott. She has spent the past couple of years performing the same function for the Europe and Latin America  market area and prior to that spent seven years running the marketing for Red Bee Media, the media services business Ericsson acquired in 2013, but tried and failed to sell a few years later.

“With the introduction of 5G we are at an exciting time in the industry,” said Ericsson CEO Börje Ekholm. “Our ability to differentiate our offering, articulate the value we bring to our customers and build strong relationships with our stakeholders will be key to build a strong company position for this next phase of industry development. Stella has the right background, experience and capabilities to lead this work going forward and I am very glad to see her stepping up to this role”.

“I really look forward to take on this exciting new role and to work together with both the global marketing and communications team and the executive team,” said Medlicott. “This is the time where the mobile industry is being transformed through 5G, generating innovation and new business opportunities across industries. Our marketing and communications abilities are key to leveraging our technology leadership in 5G.”

As both comments stress, Medlicott has stepped up to the top marketing job at an opportune time. Not only are we at the start of a new technological cycle in the telecoms world, but Ericsson’s own fortunes seem to be on the up. After the nadir of end of the Vestberg era, Ekholm has steadied the ship and, you never know, might even decide it’s safe to empower Medlicott with a bit more marketing budget.