MAM
JWT CEO Gustavo Martinez steps down, Tamara Ingram to replace him
MUMBAI: WPP has released an official notice announcing that JWT CEO and chairman Gustavo Martinez, who recently made headlines for being accused of “an unending stream of racist and sexist comments”, has stepped down from his role, and will be replaced by Tamara Ingram who is currently the chief client team officer at WPP.She will step into Martizen’s shoes as the CEO of the company.
The company statement read: “By mutual agreement, Martinez has resigned in the best interest of the J. Walter Thompson Co. George Rogers succeeds Ingram as WPP’s Chief Client Team Officer with immediate effect, in addition to his current duties as WPP’s Global Business Development Director.”
Tamara Ingram has led the P&G business at WPP since joining the company in 2004; she was previously group CEO of McCann Worldgroup, and her promotion to chief client team officer in 2015 made her one of the most powerful women in advertising.
According to the WPP statement, she will be replaced in that position immediately by global business development director George Rogers, who will occupy both roles.
The move comes a week after Erin Johnson, chief communications officer at JWT, filed a detailed 28-page lawsuit in New York on March 10 claiming, among other things, that Martinez made multiple “racist and sexist slurs.” The suit details numerous incidents, and names other senior executives at the agency that allegedly witnessed the claims or were told by Ms. Johnson that they happened.
Brands
Google completes $32 billion Wiz deal to boost AI and cloud security
Wiz joins Google Cloud but keeps multi-cloud support across rival platforms
NEW YORK: Google has completed its $32 billion acquisition of cloud security company Wiz, marking the biggest deal in the tech giant’s history and signalling a major push to strengthen security in the era of artificial intelligence and multi-cloud computing.
The New York-headquartered cybersecurity firm will join Google Cloud while continuing to operate under the Wiz brand. Crucially, the company will maintain support for multiple cloud platforms, including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Oracle Cloud, reflecting the reality that most large organisations run their systems across several cloud providers.
Google said the acquisition is designed to help organisations build and scale applications more securely as businesses and governments increasingly move critical systems and data to the cloud. At the same time, the rapid adoption of generative AI has introduced new cybersecurity risks, with attackers also using AI to launch faster and more sophisticated attacks.
Wiz has built a reputation for simplifying cloud security. Its platform maps entire cloud environments, identifying vulnerabilities, potential attack paths and misconfigurations before they can be exploited. By connecting insights from code, cloud infrastructure and runtime environments, it allows security and engineering teams to detect and fix risks early in the development cycle.
Bringing Wiz into Google Cloud will create what the company describes as a unified security platform capable of detecting, preventing and responding to threats across cloud and AI environments. The combined offering will also integrate Google’s own security capabilities, including threat intelligence tools, security operations platforms and the cybersecurity expertise of Mandiant.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the move reflects the growing importance of security as more organisations rely on AI and cloud technologies. “Keeping people safe online has always been part of Google’s mission,” he said, adding that the partnership will help organisations innovate with greater confidence.
Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian, said the goal is to make security an enabler rather than a roadblock for businesses building modern applications. He noted that the combined technologies will simplify the complex task of protecting hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
For Wiz, the acquisition opens the door to global scale while keeping its core philosophy intact. Co-founder and CEO Assaf Rappaport said the company remains committed to an open, multi-cloud approach and will continue supporting customers regardless of where their workloads run.
Over the past year, Wiz has expanded its platform to address emerging risks tied to AI applications, including tools that help organisations monitor AI usage, detect AI-specific vulnerabilities and secure AI workloads during runtime.
With Google’s infrastructure, artificial intelligence capabilities and security ecosystem now behind it, Wiz plans to accelerate development of its platform while continuing to serve enterprises, governments and start-ups operating across different cloud environments.
For Google Cloud, the acquisition adds a powerful piece to its security puzzle as competition intensifies among global cloud providers. For customers, it promises a future where building fast in the cloud does not have to come at the expense of staying secure.
