GTT names Interim CEO and new COO
Appointments

GTT names Interim CEO and new COO

Ernie Ortega, GTT Communications NEW.jpg

GTT Communications (GTT) has announced that GTT’s chief revenue officer Ernie Ortega (pictured) has been named as the interim CEO.

The board of directors also announces that Don MacNeil has joined the GTT leadership team as chief operating officer (COO).

In his new role, MacNeil will lead GTT’s network operations, service delivery, assurance and vendor management teams, as well as GTT’s product business.  

“I am delighted to name Ernie Ortega as interim CEO and Don MacNeil as GTT’s chief operating officer,” said H. Brian Thompson, founder and executive chairman of the board at GTT.

“Both Ernie and Don have a track record of delivering successful organisational change and operational improvement for national, international and global businesses.”

“Their industry experience and leadership will accelerate our drive to operational excellence, a clearly outstanding client experience, continuous improvement of our services, and the achievement of our organic growth goals."

Ortega joined GTT in June 2019 as division president, Americas. Prior to this, he served as CEO of Towerstream and previously held senior executive roles at Colt Technology Services, Cogent, and XO Communications, after beginning his career at MCI. 

As for MacNeil, prior to GTT he was chief executive officer (CEO) at FiberLight, after having served as COO, driving its business of designing, building and optimising fibre-optic networks.

In addition, he has also held several executive leadership roles over his career including COO, CMO and head of customer operations for XO Communications. MacNeil also served as chief technology officer (CTO) for EdgeConneX.

These latest appointments follow news that former CEO Rick Calder left his role as of 1 June 2020. At the time of the announcement, the company confirmed that it was transitioning into a capex-light, asset-light managed services company once the infrastructure division is sold.

Confirming that its infrastructure division has been operationally separated out from the rest of GTT. 

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