Nike Hires Cheryan Jacob as CIO
Nike continues its DTC push and digital-first approach, now naming Cheryan Jacob to lead IT efforts as chief information officer.
The CIO will help Nike simplify, standardize, and modernize its platforms, according to chief technology officer Muge Erdirik Dogan, per an internal memo obtained by Bloomberg.
This includes driving transformations across cloud, information security, and technology operations, per Jacob’s LinkedIn, taking an end-to-end view of the key foundational capabilities that enable, support, and protect Nike’s global tech team and the enterprise as a whole.
He will oversee strategy and teams related to enterprise architecture; platform engineering; developer experience; security, risk, and compliance; technical operations; and vendor strategy and management.
Efforts are already underway, with Jacobs in search of a new team member to join as senior technical leadership to help lead the transformation of Nike’s foundational infrastructure, including cloud, edge, and network.
Also read: Nike expedites product innovation with its Sports Research Lab.
Jacob’s Digital Transformation Background
Jacob brings an extensive background in IT, platform engineering, and technology transformation. He was the SVP, head of platform engineering and engagement 360 for Salesforce, where he said he helped build the platform engineering framework to support revenue growth from $900 million to $3 billion.
His work also includes a combined eight years at Microsoft where he last served as its general manager for global support engineering, data, and enterprise cloud. His role included supporting the engineering transformation of the company.
Also read: Barry Callebaut's AI and cloud partnership with Microsoft.
Also, at Epic Systems, Jacob led a team of developers in creating a new analytics product and designed internal automated testing tools to optimize and stress test software.
The new hire follows Tom Peddie’s journey back to Nike and out of retirement to help boost the company’s DTC efforts and rekindle retail partnerships amid slumped retail sales.
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