Tech’s 7 Most Powerful Women

[VelMurugan]

Tech's 7 Most Powerful Women

All those who think that technology industry's most powerful faces are all men, need to correct themselves.

The global IT industry may be largely led by men, but it has its share of fairer sex. Women, who by their grit, substance and vision have emerged among the most powerful people in the global business world.

Forbes recently released its annual list of World's 100 Most Powerful Women for 2009. While assembling the list, Forbes looked for women who run countries, big companies or influential non-profits. Their rankings are said to be a combination of two scores: visibility - by press mentions - and the size of the organization or country these women lead.

The list has as many as seven women from the IT industry. Meet the shining stars of the tech world.

Source : indiatimes

[VelMurugan]

Carol Bartz, CEO and President, Yahoo

At no. 12 on World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is Carol Bartz who took the helm at Yahoo in January 2009. Ms Bartz has served as Chief Executive Officer and as a member of the Board of Directors since January 2009 and as President since April 2009.

The tough-talking Bartz recently brokered a partnership with Microsoft to develop new search platform. A deal for which she has received both bouquets and brickbats.

Prior to joining Yahoo!, Bartz spent 14 years as CEO at Autodesk. Bartz previously held positions at Sun Microsystems, most recently serving as vice president of worldwide field operations and an executive officer of the company. Before joining Sun, she held product line and sales management positions at Digital Equipment Corporation and 3M Corporation.

Bartz holds an honors degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin.

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Ursula Burns, CEO, Xerox Corp

At no. 14 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is Xerox Corp's Ursula Burns. With her nomination to head Xerox Corporation in May, Burns became the first black woman to head a major public company in the US. Burns is also the first to succeed another woman, Anne Mulcahy, credited with turning the struggling company around.

Burns joined Xerox in 1980 as a mechanical engineering summer intern. She since held several positions in engineering including product development and planning. In June 1991, she became the executive assistant to Paul A Allaire, then Xerox chairman and chief executive officer.

From 1992 to 2000, Burns led several business teams including the office colour and fax business, office network copying business, and the departmental business unit. In May 2000, she was named senior vice president, Corporate Strategic Services, and two years later assumed the role of president, Business Group Operations.

She serves on professional and community boards, including American Express Corp, Boston Scientific Corp and CASA - The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.

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Anne Mulcahy, Chairman, Xerox Corp

At no. 15 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is another woman from Xerox Corp. This year Mulcahy handed over the reins to her longtime colleague Ursula Burns keeping the chairman's job for herself.

Mulcahy became CEO of Xerox in August 2001, and chairman on January 1, 2002. She is credited of having pulled Xerox out of a near-fatal slump in 2002. Her ideas include colour printing, eco-friendly technologies and lucrative consulting services. To compete with rivals like Canon and Hewlett-Packard, Mulcahy doubled Xerox's software R&D budget to $1.5 billion.

She began her Xerox career as a field sales representative in 1976 and assumed increasingly responsible sales and senior management positions. From 1992-1995, Mulcahy was vice president for human resources, responsible for compensation, benefits, human resource strategy, labor relations, management development and employee training.

Mulcahy earned a bachelor of arts degree in English/journalism from Marymount College in Tarrytown, NY. In addition to the Xerox board, she is a board director of Catalyst, Citigroup Inc, Fuji Xerox Company, Ltd, Target Corporation, The Washington Post Company, and is the chairman of the corporate governance task force of the Business Roundtable.

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Safra Catz, President, Oracle

Co-President of Oracle Corporation, Safra A Catz ranks at no. 16 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list. An Oracle veteran, she served as an Executive Vice President from November 1999 to January 2004, and as Senior Vice President from April 1999 to October 1999.

Safra A Catz has served as a President since January 2004, as Chief Financial Officer since November 2005, and as a Director since October 2001.

In May 2008, Ms. Catz was also appointed to a three-year term as member of the board of directors for HSBC Holdings plc, one of the world's largest banking and financial services organizations.

An Israeli, Catz held a key role in $10.3 billion takeover of software rival PeopleSoft. Prior to Oracle, Catz was at Donaldson and Lufkin & Jenrette, global investment banks. Catz holds a bachelor's degree from Wharton School and a JD from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1986.

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Ann Livermore, Ex VP, Hewlett-Packard

At no. 31 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is the head of Hewlett-Packard's $45 billion division, Ann Livermore. Among the 25 highest-paid women in the world, her group sells servers, storage devices, software and services and brings in more than a third of HP's annual sales. Livermore also played a crucial role in HP's $13.9 billion acquisition of EDS.

Livermore rose through the ranks in sales, marketing and research and development. She was on the short list of possible HP chiefs to replace Carly Fiorina. She was elected a corporate vice president in 1995 after holding a variety of management positions in marketing, sales, research and development, and business management. She joined the company in 1982.

Livermore holds a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master's degree in business administration from Stanford University. In 1997, she was elected to the board of directors of United Parcel Service.

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Cathie Lesjak, Ex VP and CFO, Hewlett-Packard

At no. 32 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is another HPian Cathie Lesjak. Lesjak is executive vice president and chief financial officer of HP, where she is responsible for the company's overall financial activities and leads several departments, including business unit finance, treasury, tax and controllership.

Lesjak has been key to CEO Mark Hurd's financially disciplined turnaround. A veteran of the company for more than two decades, Lesjak previously was senior vice president and treasurer, responsible for managing the company's worldwide cash, debt, foreign exchange, capital structure, risk management and benefits plan administration.

Lesjak has a bachelor's degree in biology from Stanford University and a master of business degree in finance from the University of California, Berkeley.

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Virginia Rometty, sr VP, IBM

At no. 69 on the World's 100 Most Powerful Women list is Virginia Rometty. Rometty leads IBM's sales force in 170 markets around the world. Rometty spearheaded the integration of PricewaterhouseCoopers Consulting -- IBM's largest acquisition in professional services history.

She previously ran global business services, managing 100,000 employees and $19.6 billion in 2008 revenues. Prior to this, she was general manager of IBM Global Services, Americas, where she led a team of more than 75,000, and was responsible for strategic leadership, operations and client relationships. Rometty has also served as the general manager of strategy, marketing and sales operations for IBM Global Services worldwide.

Before joining IBM's services business, Rometty was general manager of IBM's Global Insurance and Financial Services Sector, where she led the company's business strategy for the worldwide insurance marketplace, with responsibility for marketing, sales and consulting. She also supervised the operations of IBM's Insurance Research Centers in New York, Switzerland and Japan, and was in charge of IBM's insurance solutions development worldwide.