Matthew Willsher has been appointed as President and CEO of PTCL and Ufone, a notification sent to Pakistan Stock Exchange said.
As per sources, decision was made during a PTCL board meeting yesterday and it was decided that Mr. Matthew Willsher will replace Rashid Khan, who had been the group CEO for PTCL since March 2019, effective December 1st, 2020.
Mr. Willsher brings along over 25 years of experience in Consumer Goods and Telecommunication sectors. He has previously worked with Procter & Gamble, British Telecom, LG Telecom, Telstra, HK CSL, Maxis and Etisalat.
The roles have included those which are general management and operational such as he has worked as CEO Etisalat Nigeria and Chief Operating Officer of HK CSL. He has also taken up more marketing/strategic roles such as he worked as CMO, Strategic Marketing Director for Telstra Mobile.
Rashid Khan, the outgoing President and CEO, took charge of Ufone in August 2017 and was later made the group CEO of PTCL group in March 2019.
Rashid Khan is credited for various initiatives at the group, particularly for modernizing the network (both Ufone and PTCL) and enhancing customer experience of the users. He’s also marked for turning around both Ufone and PTCL in a fierce Pakistani telecom market.
PTCL, under headship of Rashid Khan, reported 350% growth in YoY quarterly profits during Q3 2020. He’s also credited for growing customer base for both Ufone and PTCL, and that too during COVID-19 period. PTCL, in fact, reported highest number of broadband additions during Q3 2020 since 2014.
Rashid Khan also oversaw the very complex and critical phase of integration between Ufone and PTCL.
Update: PTCL has now issued a statement on development, here’s what it said:
PTCL appoints Matthew Willsher as President & CEO
Islamabad, October 18, 2020: The PTCL Board of Directors has appointed Matthew Willsher, currently CEO of Etisalat Afghanistan, to the post of CEO PTCL Group (PTCL & Ufone) effective 1st December 2020. He succeeds Rashid Khan, who was President & CEO of the PTCL Group since March 2019 and decided to leave due to personal reasons.
Matthew has been working in the telecom industry for over 25 years. Previously he has been CEO of Etisalat in Afghanistan and in Nigeria, and held CXO roles for Etisalat in UAE, Maxis in Malaysia, and CSL in Hong Kong. He has also worked in Australia, South Korea, Holland and the UK in a variety of commercial, operational and corporate roles. Matthew’s career started in marketing for Procter & Gamble.
He holds a degree in Physics from Oxford University in the UK, a Masters in Management from McGill University in Canada, and a Diploma in International Practicing Management from INSEAD in France.
During Rashid Khan’s leadership, multiple initiatives were taken at PTCL to improve network availability, stability & customer service levels which have helped improve customer experience today, resulting in PTCL consistently achieving positive net adds since last 6 months. All these positive indicators have helped PTCL retail business to return to growth in Q3’20. Ufone’s turnaround also took place in his leadership where the subscriber base grew 22% and data subscribers grew by 86%. Despite several limitations, for last two years, Ufone has managed to beat expectations.
The Board thanked Rashid Khan for his leadership and commitment, and welcomed Matthew to the PTCL Group. Ends
Best wishes for Mathew… but seems he would not b able bring mich difference due to legacy of long list of issues… I believe, Etisalat is not interested in growth of PTCL or UFONE.. wrong decisions at wrong point in time, made Ufone so weak that hardly tenable now.. Board of Directors are interested to take heavy board meeting fees.. How a corporate company suatains and business viable, if it has to pay 7000-10000 dollars per meeting to 9 of its baord memebrs for every meeting…. Best wishes for Mathew…
Koi Pakistani nahe milta kia .
Jis ko nikala wo pakistani tha despite good performance
UAE & African countries may lacking talent, but Pakistan is not so. We may find here many Rashids and even better than him. One has to be visionary for this task.God help us.
You’ll find a lot of administrators (like Rashid) here, sadly very few visionaries who can actually drive innovation in a typical telecom company.
Paisa pe Zoor de rahy hain quality ka Allah hi hafiz hai. yeh log fiber deploy karein major cities ma to kuch maza aye internet ka aur small companies like fiberlink and storm fiber ko buy kar lein.
Itni option available hain pta nahi kia In k damag ma bhosa bhara hai.
Any how ptcl is owned by uae rulers and they will put their own person. Better if an Army General was appinoted . May be Chief did not know about this post. A retired gen from signals was better choice.
Heard Telenor also gonna bye this group..
Buy*
Thanks God Rashid is gone, he did nothing for PTCL employees…