Facebook has hired Antonio Lucio, former HP head of marketing, to be its chief marketing officer, as the company finds itself at an “inflection point” following several high-profile incidents, including a massive data leak.
Lucio’s hiring was announced by Chris Cox, Facebook’s chief product officer, in a blog post on Thursday. The exec most recently spent three years with HP, and was CMO for Visa and PepsiCo before that.
Lucio “has an extraordinary reputation in the industry as a leader, a marketer, an operator, and a wise, gracious, and deeply principled human being,” said Cox in his announcement. “He has been outspoken on the need to build authentic global brands with integrity and from places of principle, and also on the importance of building diverse teams at every level in the organization.”
The Louisiana State-grad will start on Sept. 4. He’s replacing Gary Briggs, who stepped down earlier this year — becoming one of many Facebook execs to move on in 2018.
Lucio joins Facebook at a pivotal moment, following the Cambridge Analytica data leak, when up to 87 million users had their profiles unknowingly accessed. The leak was a black eye for the company, sending CEO Mark Zuckerberg to Washington, D.C. to testify, while forcing the company to change its data policies. Facebook is also fighting to stop trolls from interfering in the 2018 U.S. midterms in the same way Kremlin-linked influencers pushed their way into the 2016 election conversation.
“Facebook’s story is at an inflection point,” added Cox. “We have never faced bigger challenges, and we have never had more opportunities to have a positive impact on the world — in our families, our friendships, our communities, and our democracy — by improving our products at their core, and then by telling the story outside that we all know to be true inside.”
Earlier this week, Facebook removed hundreds of accounts with ties to Iran and Russia for attempting to spread misinformation.