Jon Iwata leads IBM’s marketing, communications and citizenship organization. His global team is responsible for the marketing of IBM’s product and services portfolio in more than 170 countries, market intelligence, communications, and stewardship of the IBM brand, recognized as one of the most valuable in the world.
Jon is the architect of IBM’s strategic brand platforms, including e-business, Smarter Planet and Watson. He is recognized for innovation – from creating Think Academy, a mobile- and cloud-delivered online university serving more than 375,000 IBMers, to the application of cognitive technologies in marketing and communications.
Jon reports to IBM Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer Ginni Rometty. He is chairman of the IBM Values and Policy Advisory Board and vice chairman of the IBM International Foundation.
Jon joined IBM in 1984 at the company’s Almaden Research Center in Silicon Valley. He was appointed vice president, corporate communications, in 1995 and senior vice president, communications, in 2002. He assumed his current role on July 1, 2008.
Jon is a trustee of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. He is a director of the Japan Society, a director of the Association of National Advertisers and an advisory board member for the Yale Center for Customer Insights. He is past chairman of the Arthur W. Page Society, a professional group of Chief Communications Officers.
In 2015, Jon was inducted into the CMO Club Hall of Fame. That same year he received the Distinguished Service Award from The Seminar, an organization consisting of Chief Communications Officers. He holds a B.A. from the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at San Jose State University.
Jon is co-inventor of a U.S. patent for advanced semiconductor lithography technology.
