Twitter has appointed its first pan-Asia executive (excluding those in Japan) after it nabbed Aliza Knox, formerly Managing Director of Commerce for Google in Asia Pacific, its second high-ranked Google Asia executive in six months, Techcrunch reports.
The appointment comes some five months after the the poaching of influential advertising exec Shailesh Rao. Knox, who tweets at @alizaknox, was responsible for Google’s Business and Sales for Shopping, Offers and Wallet in the region so it goes without saying that she has a strong background in commerce.
Techcrunch says that Knox was Google’s highest ranking woman in Asia, but soon she’ll be the first exec in Twitter’s Singapore-based pan-Asia office, which operates separately to the country-focused Japan team.
The hire is an ideal match for Twitter which is continuing to ramp up its revenue-generating with Asia very much a key part of the plan. While it is making progress in Japan — where CEO Dick Costolo previously said it would increase its sales staff and efforts — the rest of the vast region has little on-the-ground representation, despite four of its countries ranking in the world’s the top ten Twitter markets — Indonesia, India, Japan and the Philippines.
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Twitter’s hiring of Google executives is anything but common and that’s also true in Asia, despite both companies smaller teams there.
The microblogging service picked up Rao, who served a dual role as managing director of Media and Platforms across Asia Pacific and managing director of Google India, back in Feburary. Unlike Knox, the Canada-born exec has not remained in Asia following his move, which saw him take up the US-based position of Vice President, International Revenue at Twitter.
We’ve reached out to Twitter and Google for comment.
Update: Google declined to comment while Twitter is yet to respond.
Image via Born 1945 / Flickr
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