IBM Malaysia names Catherine Lian managing director

IBM Malaysia has appointed Catherine Lian (pictured) as its managing director, reporting to GM of IBM ASEAN Patricia Yim. In her new role, Lian will be responsible for the business growth and leadership of IBM in Malaysia, building on the strong collaboration with clients, partners, the government and communities to advance digital transformation and inclusive progress. This will be done using AI, cloud, blockchain and other emerging technologies. Lian succeeds Chong Chye Neo who retired. Prior to her new role, Lian was the managing director at Dell Indonesia. She has also held various management roles within Dell Technologies across ASEAN and South Asian markets including Malaysia, Korea, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, China, Bangladesh, Indochina and Cambodia. In 2018, IBM posted a full year revenue of US$79.6 billion globally, a 1% increase year-on-year. compared with US$79.1 billion in 2017. Its full-year cloud revenue increased by 12% to US$19.2 billion, with US$11.3 billion delivered as a service and US$7.8 billion for cloud-related hardware, software and services to enable its clients to implement cloud solutions across public, private and multi-cloud environments. IBM's chairman, president and CEO said that in 2018, the company returned to full-year revenue growth, reflecting "growing demand" for its services and leadership solutions in hybrid cloud, AI, analytics and security.