Publicis Sapient has appointed Ashwaq Al Shathri as the Country Managing Director for Saudi Arabia, effective May 2024. Ashwaq will be based in the software company’s Riyadh office, working closely with regional teams to spearhead digital business transformation and growth strategy across the KSA region.

In her new role, Ashwaq brings over 25 years of leadership experience, and most recently she served as the Government Executive Territory Manager at Microsoft in Saudi Arabia. She has also held key positions at Vogue Brand Co., Oracle, and Samba Financial Group.

On the academic front, Ashwaq holds a Computer Science degree from King Saud University, and a certificate in Women Leadership of 2030 Vision from INSEAD. Her core competencies include business strategy, leadership development, team management, sales, and business acquisition financing.

Welcoming Ashwaq to the leadership team, Nigel Vaz, CEO of Publicis Sapient, said, “We’re committed to supporting KSA’s technology-driven transformation and realisation of Vision 2030, while also helping position KSA as a leader in digital innovation on the global stage. In our ambition to invest and expand our footprint in the region, we’re thrilled to welcome Ashwaq to the team. Her experience in driving transformational work and growth, as well as her leadership skills, will have an immediate impact in delivering value to our customers and attracting new business as we continue to scale.”

Srinivas Devulapalli, Managing Director of Publicis Sapient MENA, also commented, “Ashwaq brings a wealth of expertise to Publicis Sapient. Her appointment as our Country Managing Director for Saudi Arabia will directly contribute to our continued business growth as we scale our expertise in the Middle East to better serve our clients and their customers and help them transform digitally.”

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Ashwaq expressed her enthusiasm, stating, “I’m delighted to be joining Publicis Sapient’s incredibly talented team in Riyadh. The company’s unique expertise, SPEED (Strategy, Product, Experience, Engineering, and Data and AI) capabilities, and AI-driven solutions enable us to meet the challenges of our customers in KSA who want to accelerate their transformation and create new experiences and innovative services.”