SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

Cezanne has appointed Julie Lally as Chief Product Officer, adding a senior product role as the HR and payroll software company expands its leadership team.

Lally will lead product strategy, innovation and delivery across the platform, working with the leadership team on its direction. The newly created role comes as Cezanne looks to develop its HR and payroll offering in response to changing customer and workplace needs.

She joins with more than 25 years of experience in payroll and HR technology, having held senior roles at Zellis, ADP, MHR, Mitrefinch, Advanced and Ciphr. Her background spans product, growth and commercial roles in a sector reshaped by demand for more integrated systems and simpler user experiences.

Among her best-known achievements is the design and delivery of what Cezanne described as the world’s first real-time payroll solution. It is presenting that track record as a sign of how it wants to develop its own platform as employers seek closer links between HR administration and payroll processing.

Lally began her career in payroll operations and later spent more than a decade as a tutor with the Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals. That grounding gives her direct experience of a function that remains heavily regulated and central to workforce management.

Growth stage

The hire comes at what Cezanne describes as an important stage in its development. Based in London, with an office in Glasgow, the company sells HR software covering recruitment, onboarding, core HR administration, surveys, performance management and succession planning, alongside payroll software and managed payroll services for UK companies.

The HR and payroll software market has become increasingly competitive as employers look for systems that can manage the full employee lifecycle while reducing manual work for HR teams. Providers are also under pressure to keep products aligned with changes in working patterns, employee expectations, and the compliance demands attached to payroll and people data.

By creating a Chief Product Officer role, Cezanne is placing greater emphasis on senior product leadership. Such appointments have become more common across software companies as boards seek closer oversight of how products are designed, prioritised and delivered.

The move also brings in an executive with a long record in payroll, an area often treated as adjacent to HR software rather than fully integrated with it. That distinction has narrowed in recent years as employers seek joined-up systems combining workforce data, pay administration and employee services.

Simon Noble, Cezanne’s Chief Executive, linked the hire to the company’s next stage of growth and its plans for the platform.

“Bringing someone of Julie’s calibre and experience into the senior team is a significant moment for Cezanne HR. We are at a pivotal point in our growth, with real ambition for what our platform can achieve for HR teams and the organisations they support.”

“Julie’s combination of deep domain knowledge, hands-on product leadership and genuine understanding of what customers need gives us exactly the right foundation to move forward with confidence. Her track record of delivering innovation that makes a tangible difference to people’s working lives is precisely what this role demands, and I’m delighted to welcome her to the business,” said Noble.

Lally said she was joining the company at an important point in its development, highlighting the challenge of balancing customer expectations with internal product development.

“It’s a real privilege to be joining Cezanne at such an important stage in its journey. There is a strong sense of responsibility that comes with the role, given the expectations of both our customers and our people, alongside the impressive platform and passion for innovation across the business. It’s very clear, Cezanne has a genuine commitment to doing things the right way – evolving the product thoughtfully while staying true to its values. I’m excited about what lies ahead and very much looking forward to being part of the next chapter in Cezanne’s product evolution,” said Lally.

SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

Vertiv has appointed Frieda He as Chief Procurement Officer, putting her in charge of the company’s global purchasing and supplier management operations.

She joins the digital infrastructure supplier after serving as chief procurement officer at Polestar, where she was also a member of the group management team. There, she oversaw more than USD $3 billion in annual global spend across direct and indirect materials, supplier quality, research and development industrial programmes, cost management, and global real estate.

At Vertiv, she will focus on strengthening supply chain resilience, supporting growth, improving cost and value, and overseeing supplier quality. Vertiv operates in more than 130 countries and supplies power and thermal management products and services for data centres, communications networks, and commercial and industrial applications.

Before Polestar, He held senior procurement roles at Volvo Cars, including vice president and head of global propulsion and sustainability procurement. She led an organisation with more than USD $9 billion in annual spend and was involved in the company’s shift towards electrification.

Earlier in her career, she held procurement and supply chain roles in China and across the Asia-Pacific region, focusing on global sourcing, cost engineering, and supplier development.

Supply chain focus

The appointment comes as manufacturers serving the data centre market face greater scrutiny over supply chains, component sourcing, and production costs. Rising demand for infrastructure linked to artificial intelligence and higher-density computing has increased pressure on suppliers of power and cooling systems.

Procurement has become more prominent for companies in those markets, particularly where expansion depends on securing components, managing supplier performance, and limiting disruption. For Vertiv, which sells equipment used in critical facilities, procurement decisions also affect product availability and margins.

Chief Executive Officer Gio Albertazzi said the hire reflects Vertiv’s next phase of growth. “Frieda He is a proven global leader with deep experience building and scaling resilient, sustainable supply chains,” he said. “Her expertise in complex, multinational procurement environments and her track record of driving operational discipline and value creation will be critical as Vertiv continues to scale to meet accelerating demand from AI-driven and high-density digital infrastructure.”

He holds bachelor’s degrees in general studies and business and commerce from Northeast Normal University in China, as well as an executive MBA from the University of Oxford in England.

Industry backdrop

Vertiv supplies hardware, software, and related services for facilities where uninterrupted operation is critical. Its products are used in environments ranging from large data centres to communications and industrial sites, where operators are under pressure to increase computing capacity while controlling energy use and capital spending.

The choice of a procurement executive with experience in automotive and electrification reflects how supply chain management has moved up the corporate agenda. Those sectors have faced raw material volatility, regulatory requirements, supplier bottlenecks, and complex global sourcing arrangements, all of which also affect manufacturers serving digital infrastructure markets.

In previous roles, He worked through periods of industry disruption and was involved in cost controls, governance, and structural transactions. That background suggests Vertiv is placing procurement discipline alongside product and market expansion as it responds to customer demand.

Commenting on her move, He said: “I’m excited to join Vertiv at such a transformative moment for the digital infrastructure industry. Vertiv’s role at the centre of the global data centre and critical infrastructure ecosystem presents a unique opportunity to create value through strong partnerships, operational excellence, and responsible, resilient supply chains.”

Innovation City has introduced a blockchain-based digital business identity system for all companies registered in its Ras Al Khaimah free zone, describing it as the first system of its kind for business registration.

Under the new arrangement, each registered company receives what Innovation City calls a sovereign digital identity on OPN Chain, a blockchain developed by IOPn. The system is intended to replace PDF business licences and conventional database records with a verifiable on-chain record.

The move comes as the UAE pushes to shift half of federal government sectors, services and operations to agentic AI within two years. That effort is focused on areas including licences, permits, compliance checks, taxation and cross-border interactions.

The new identity framework is designed to let businesses prove their status through a cryptographically verifiable digital record. According to Innovation City, banks, regulators, investors and AI systems would be able to verify authenticity in seconds rather than days or weeks.

The free zone also argues that the model could reduce document fraud and make it harder to obscure beneficial ownership or create shell companies. Every ownership change, compliance update and verification would be recorded on-chain and available for audit.

The initiative connects Ras Al Khaimah’s business registration environment with broader efforts in the UAE to digitise government processes. It also reflects growing interest across the Gulf in using blockchain-based records for trade, identity and financial infrastructure.

Paul Dawalibi, Chief Executive Officer of Innovation City, framed the launch as a break from established business registration practices.

“Today we don’t just register companies, we give them a soul on the blockchain,” said Paul Dawalibi, Chief Executive Officer, Innovation City. “For decades business identity has been trapped in paper, PDFs, and fragile databases – slow, opaque, and built for a world that no longer exists. We are ending that era. Every enterprise in Innovation City now carries a living, verifiable digital identity that travels with it across borders, platforms, and straight into the age of intelligent agents. Ras Al Khaimah isn’t following the future. We are writing it. One more thing: the companies that claim their place on this chain today will lead the global economy tomorrow. Everyone else will be explaining why they’re still using yesterday’s tools.”

How it works

The digital identity is issued when a company registers and exists as an immutable digital asset on the blockchain. In practical terms, that means the business record is no longer limited to a document issued by a free zone authority or a database entry held by a single institution.

IOPn, which provides the underlying blockchain layer, says the system is intended to support use across jurisdictions, institutions and sectors. It describes OPN Chain as an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain with throughput of more than 10,000 transactions per second and sub-second finality.

Mojtaba Asadian, Chief Executive Officer of IOPn, said the system was intended as a base layer for a broader digital identity framework.

“IOPn is the sovereign infrastructure layer enabling the UAE’s agentic AI economy, starting with business identity and built to scale across jurisdictions, institutions, and sectors. Cryptographically secure. Evolving. Interoperable. Compliant. When Innovation City chose OPN Chain to power the world’s first on-chain business identities, they didn’t just pick a technology – they chose the infrastructure of digital sovereignty. Together, we are proving that the future of enterprise is not centralized databases or fragmented systems. It is sovereign, verifiable, and alive on-chain,” said Asadian.

Wider context

Ras Al Khaimah has sought to position itself as a business and technology hub within the UAE, alongside larger commercial centres such as Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Innovation City is one of the emirate’s specialist free zones, focused on sectors including artificial intelligence, Web3, gaming, robotics and health technology.

The UAE has also made digital government and artificial intelligence central to its economic strategy. A business identity system that software agents can verify instantly would fit that direction, particularly if government services are increasingly handled by automated systems rather than manual checks.

Questions remain over how widely such a system will be recognised outside the free zone and how financial institutions, regulators and counterparties in other jurisdictions will integrate with it. Interoperability with existing licensing systems, company registries and compliance frameworks will be central if on-chain business identities are to move beyond a local pilot or specialist environment.

Even so, the launch marks a notable attempt to apply blockchain infrastructure to a core administrative process rather than a financial product or digital asset market. In that sense, the development is less about cryptocurrency than about changing how a company proves its legal existence and operating status.

Innovation City says every company registered in the free zone now receives the digital identity as part of its incorporation record, replacing the need for a static PDF business licence.