Former Insurance Head Rometty Becomes IBM CEO

Virginia Rometty, who has been with IBM since 1981, served as GM of IBM's Global Insurance and Financial Services Sector on her way to succeeding Sam Palmisano.

Armonk, N.Y.-based IBM has named Virginia Rometty its next president and CEO, effective January 1.

I&T's sister publication, Bank Systems & Technology, reports:

Rometty joined IBM in 1981 as a systems engineer and has since held several leadership positions in the company, including managing the Global Insurance and Financial Services divisions. In her former role as senior vice president of IBM Global Business Services, she led the successful acquisition of PricewaterhouseCoopers Consulting and built a team of more than 100,000 business consultants and service experts. Rometty also helped IBM attain a yearly revenue of more than $99 billion in her current role as the company's global sales leader.

Specifically, Rometty headed the practice area in the late 1990s. She was named head of its consulting arm, Global Services in 2002.

She was appointed to her latest position, as the company's global sales leader, last year.

Nathan Golia is senior editor of Insurance & Technology. He joined the publication in 2010 as associate editor and covers all aspects of the nexus between insurance and information technology, including mobility, distribution, core systems, customer interaction, and risk ... View Full Bio