Michael Sievert is an American business executive, currently the president and CEO of

T-Mobile US T-Mobile US, Inc. is an American wireless network operator headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas and Bellevue, Washington, U.S. Its largest shareholder is a multinational telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom AG, which , holds 48.4 pe ...

, and a member of the company's board of directors. In November 2019, T-Mobile announced that Sievert would be promoted from

chief operating officer A chief operating officer or chief operations officer, also called a COO, is one of the highest-ranking executive positions in an organization, composing part of the " C-suite". The COO is usually the second-in-command at the firm, especially if ...

(COO) to CEO in May 2020 when

John Legere John Legere (born June 4, 1958) is an American businessman, former chief executive officer (CEO) and president of T-Mobile US. He previously worked for AT&T, Dell, Global Crossing. He resigned as CEO following the approval of the merger of T-Mob ...

stepped down. Sievert took control a month earlier than planned, on April 1, 2020, the same day

T-Mobile T-Mobile is the brand name used by some of the mobile communications subsidiaries of the German telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom AG in the Czech Republic ( T-Mobile Czech Republic), Poland ( T-Mobile Polska), the United States (T-Mobil ...

closed its merger with Sprint.

Early life and education

Sievert was born in Canton, Ohio. At age 10, he became a paper carrier for ''

The Repository ''The Repository'' is an American daily local newspaper serving the Canton, Ohio area. It is currently owned by Gannett. History Historically, the newspaper had strong Republican connections, most notably with President William McKinley, who wa ...

'', using his earnings to buy a Radio Shack TRS-80 and, later, a Commodore 64. He graduated from

GlenOak High School GlenOak High School is a public high school in Plain Township, Ohio, United States, near Canton. It is the only high school in the Plain Local School District. Sports teams are called the Golden Eagles, and they compete in the Ohio High School ...

in 1987 and received a bachelor's degree in economics from the

Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania ( ; also known as Wharton Business School, the Wharton School, Penn Wharton, and Wharton) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in ...

in 1991.

Career

Sievert started his career at

Procter & Gamble The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/consumer he ...

, where he oversaw brands such as

Pepto-Bismol Bismuth subsalicylate, sold generically as pink bismuth and under the brand names Pepto-Bismol and BisBacter, is an antacid medication used to treat temporary discomforts of the stomach and gastrointestinal tract, such as nausea, heartburn, indig ...

and

Crest Crest or CREST may refer to: Buildings *The Crest (Huntington, New York), a historic house in Suffolk County, New York *"The Crest", an alternate name for 63 Wall Street, in Manhattan, New York *Crest Castle (Château Du Crest), Jussy, Switzerla ...

. He subsequently worked at IBM and

Clearwire Clearwire Corporation (stylized as clearw˙re) was a telecommunications operator which provided mobile and fixed wireless broadband communications services to retail and wholesale customers in the United States, Belgium, Ireland and Spain. Clearw ...

. He was also executive vice president (EVP) and chief global marketing and sales officer at

E-Trade E-Trade Financial Corporation (stylized as E*TRADE) is a financial services subsidiary of Morgan Stanley, which offers an electronic trading platform to trade financial assets. The company receives revenue from interest income on margin balan ...

and CEO of tablet gaming company Discovery Bay Games. From 2002 to 2005, Sievert was EVP and CMO of

AT&T Wireless AT&T Mobility LLC, also known as AT&T Wireless and Trade name, marketed as simply AT&T, is an American telecommunications company. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T, AT&T Inc. and provides wireless services in the United States. AT&T Mobi ...

. He joined

Microsoft's Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation, multinational technology company, technology corporation producing Software, computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at th ...

Global

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ser ...

Group as corporate vice president of product management in 2005, leading preparations for the release of Longhorn (later called

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, which was released five years before, at the time being the longest time span between successive releases of ...

). In 2008 he co-founded Switchbox Labs, a startup acquired by Lenovo in 2009. In 2012,

, T-Mobile's then-new CEO, hired Sievert as CMO. Sievert became COO of T-Mobile in 2015, then became the company's president in 2018. During this time, Sievert oversaw the "

Un-carrier Un-carrier is a marketing campaign created by T-Mobile US with Prophet, and advertising company Publicis. It debuted in March 2013, where the company introduced a new streamlined plan structure for new customers which drops contracts, subsidized pho ...

" marketing campaign, which sought to rebrand T-Mobile's public image with a focus on no overage charges, no contracts, unlimited data, and other offerings. In April 2020, Sievert succeeded Legere as CEO of T-Mobile. Under Sievert's leadership, T-Mobile overtook

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile te ...

in total customers to become the #2 wireless provider in the U.S. (behind

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas ...

), surpassed 100 million total customers, and created the first nationwide standalone 5G network in the U.S. Sievert has declared his strategy of focusing on dominating in 5G, saying “We’re making the rules for the 5G era because we’re way ahead — and I mean miles ahead." In October 2017, he joined the board of Canadian company Shaw Communications.

Political issues

In June 2020, Sievert decided to pull all

advertisements from

Tucker Carlson Tonight ''Tucker Carlson Tonight'' is an American talk show and current affairs program hosted by conservative commentator Tucker Carlson on the television network Fox News. The show premiered in November 2016 and includes political commentary, monolog ...

because of rhetoric that criticized the

Black Lives Matter movement Black Lives Matter (abbreviated BLM) is a decentralized political and social movement that seeks to highlight racism, discrimination, and racial inequality experienced by black people. Its primary concerns are incidents of police bruta ...

. When announcing the move, Sievert tweeted, "Bye-bye,

Tucker Carlson Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson (born May 16, 1969) is an American television host, conservative political commentator and writer who has hosted the nightly political talk show '' Tucker Carlson Tonight'' on Fox News since 2016. Carlson began ...

!" Sievert also published an open letter about T-Mobile's diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

Personal life

Sievert has a private pilot's license and flies a

seaplane A seaplane is a powered fixed-wing aircraft capable of taking off and landing (alighting) on water.Gunston, "The Cambridge Aerospace Dictionary", 2009. Seaplanes are usually divided into two categories based on their technological characteri ...

as a hobby.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sievert, Michael American business executives Deutsche Telekom People from Canton, Ohio American technology chief executives Living people Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania alumni 1968 births 1969 births