LiveRamp® (NYSE: RAMP), the leading global data connectivity platform, today announced the following leadership appointments, effective immediately.
- Diego Panama, senior vice president of revenue, has been appointed chief commercial officer. Panama’s appointment follows a comprehensive search process to identify the next leader of LiveRamp’s commercial organization. As chief commercial officer, Panama will report to Scott Howe, LiveRamp CEO, and oversee all revenue-generating activities at LiveRamp, including the sales organization, customer success, channel partnerships, and sales strategy.
- Grant Ries, senior vice president of growth, former BlueKai founder, has been appointed executive vice president of emerging markets. In this role, Ries will focus on continuing to expand LiveRamp’s presence in new business sectors outside of advertising and marketing.
“Today’s announcement underscores LiveRamp’s commitment to both hiring and fostering world-class executives. We invest heavily in the professional development of our team and view the impressive opportunities our leaders pursue as evidence of the incredibly deep bench of talent we have built,” said LiveRamp CEO Scott Howe. “Diego is a highly motivational leader and embodies the technical expertise, business acumen and focus on execution needed to oversee LiveRamp’s commercial organization. Grant brings proven entrepreneurial expertise and a unique perspective on strategic business growth to his new role. We look forward to continuing to benefit from Diego’s and Grant’s valuable contributions in these expanded roles.”
Since joining LiveRamp in 2014 as one of the earliest salespeople, Panama has been integral to the evolution of the company’s sales team and growth strategy. In his most recent position as senior vice president of revenue, Panama led LiveRamp’s commercial and strategic partnerships with all customers and prospects, including serving as the interim leader of the commercial organization since April 2021.
“I am honored to assume the role of chief commercial officer at this exciting time in LiveRamp’s history,” said Panama. “Our customers have always been at the center of our business, and in today’s rapidly evolving environment, the role we play in helping them use data to remain competitive has never been more critical. I believe the opportunities ahead for LiveRamp and our customers are enormous, and I’m eager to continue working with our talented team to ensure we’re ideally positioned to reach our full potential.”
Panama succeeds James Arra, who successfully led LiveRamp’s commercial organization for over seven years before deciding to create a new role leading the company’s cloud partnership strategy, one of its most important long-term initiatives. Arra has been working closely with Panama to ensure a smooth transition.
“Diego has a deep understanding of the unique space we serve between data, platforms and applications, and has been integral in helping customers navigate the dynamic and complex data ecosystem in which we operate,” commented Arra, head of cloud partnerships and former chief commercial officer at LiveRamp. “Importantly, LiveRamp’s bookings momentum is only accelerating, as fiscal 2021 second-half bookings were up more than 50% year-over-year.”
During his tenure, Panama has been integral to the evolution of LiveRamp’s sales organization and growth strategy. Panama also plays a crucial role in expanding LiveRamp’s Diversity Inclusion and Belonging (DIB) initiatives. He sits on the company’s DIB Council, serves as the executive sponsor of the LatinX Employee Resource Group and mentors several individuals inside and outside the organization. A customer-centric and analytical leader, he spent the early part of his career working in product, including a role as product manager at Microsoft where he helped launch the programmatic advertising business. Panama grew up in El Salvador before coming to the U.S. to study mathematics and economics at Yale. He went on to receive a master’s degree from MIT where he focused his studies on data, analytics and disruptive technologies.
As EVP of emerging markets, Ries leads the expansion of LiveRamp’s presence into new business sectors outside of advertising and marketing. He previously was head of LiveRamp B2B, and also oversaw LiveRamp’s growth business, including TV and LiveRamp’s Data Marketplace. Ries joined LiveRamp following the 2018 acquisition of Pacific Data Partners, a company he co-founded that was a leading digital advertising B2B data marketplace. Ries was also co-founder, board member and CRO of BlueKai, which built the world’s largest consumer data marketplace and data management platform (DMP). Oracle acquired BlueKai in 2014 and Ries served as vice president of the Oracle Data Cloud, a global business unit he co-launched. Ries earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Washington.
About LiveRamp
LiveRamp is the leading data connectivity platform for the safe and effective use of data. Powered by core identity capabilities and an unparalleled network, LiveRamp enables companies and their partners to better connect, control, and activate data to transform customer experiences and generate more valuable business outcomes. LiveRamp’s fully interoperable and neutral infrastructure delivers end-to-end addressability for the world’s top brands, agencies, and publishers. For more information, visit www.LiveRamp.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended (the “PSLRA”). These statements, which are not statements of historical fact, may contain estimates, assumptions, projections and/or expectations regarding the Company’s financial position, results of operations, market position, product development, growth opportunities, economic conditions, and other similar forecasts and statements of expectation. Forward-looking statements are often identified by words or phrases such as “anticipate,” “estimate,” “plan,” “expect,” “believe,” “intend,” “foresee,” “continued,” “positioned for” or the negative of these terms or other similar variations thereof.
These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to a number of factors and uncertainties that could cause the Company’s actual results and experiences to differ materially from the anticipated results and expectations expressed in the forward-looking statements.
Among the factors that may cause actual results and expectations to differ from anticipated results and expectations expressed in forward-looking statements are uncertainties related to COVID-19 and the associated impact on our suppliers, customers and partners; the Company’s dependence upon customer renewals; new customer additions and upsell within our subscription business; our reliance upon partners, including data suppliers; competition; and attracting and retaining talent. Additional risks relate to maintaining our culture and our ability to innovate and evolve while working remotely and within a rapidly changing industry, while also avoiding disruption from acquisition and divestiture activities. Our international operations are also subject to risks that may harm the Company’s business. The risk of a significant breach of the confidentiality of the information or the security of our or our customers’, suppliers’, or other partners’ computer systems could be detrimental to our business, reputation and results of operations. Other business risks include unfavorable publicity and negative public perception about our industry; interruptions or delays in service from data center hosting vendors we rely upon; and our dependence on the continued availability of third-party data hosting and transmission services. Our clients’ ability to use data on our platform could be restricted if the industry’s use of third-party cookies and tracking technology declines due to technology platform changes, regulation or increased user controls. Changes in regulations relating to information collection and use represents a risk, as well as changes in tax laws and regulations that are applied to our customers which could cause enterprise software budget tightening. In addition, third parties may claim that we are infringing their intellectual property or may infringe our intellectual property which could result in competitive injury and / or the incurrence of significant costs and draining of our resources.
For a discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties, please refer to LiveRamp’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for our fiscal year 2021 ended March 31, 2021, and LiveRamp’s Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q issued in fiscal year 2021.
The financial information set forth in this press release reflects estimates based on information available at this time.
LiveRamp assumes no obligation and does not currently intend to update these forward-looking statements.
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