26 April 2019

Ibrahim will take on her new role August 31st 2019

Ericsson announced that Rafiah Ibrahim, senior vice president and head of market area Middle East and Africa will step down from her role to become advisor to company chief executive officer Börje Ekholm.

Ibrahim joined the Swedish firm in 1996 and has since held various managerial positions across the company. She had been in her most recent role since April 2017.

Ekholm praised Ibrahim for her contribution to Ericsson over the years and highlighted some of her key achievements in that time. “Rafiah has been a very important leader in our sales and delivery organisation,” said Ekholm.

“In her latest assignment, she successfully led the merger of two important markets, Middle East & Africa, increasing customer value and securing scale and efficiency as well as implementing a robust operational structure.”

Ericsson made no further comment on Ibrahim’s move but said in a statement that a recruitment process was already in place and that a successor would be named in due course. However, the company did not indicate whether Ibrahim would be replaced before she takes on her new position in late August. It is also unclear at this stage whether the replacement is most likely to be an internal or external candidate.

Speaking at the Mobile World Congress 2019 in late February, Ibrahim said affordability would be no barrier to people embracing 5G as devices will become cheaper when the technology is more commonplace. “When I download a lot of video, it becomes obvious that soon 4G will not be enough,” she said.

“Soon even consumers will want more. The more you have the more you want. Is it affordability (that is the problem)? It won’t be.”