Karen Sheriff has been promoted from chief operating office to CEO of Bell Aliant. She replaces Stephen Wetmore, who announced in July he was stepping down. Sheriff joined Bell Canada in 1999 as senior vice-president of product management and development and later became chief marketing officer. In 2003 she became president of Bell Canada’s small and medium business division and then moved to Bell Aliant, which has operations in six provinces.
"Karen's extensive experience as a telecommunications executive and deep knowledge of Bell Aliant position her well to provide sound leadership to our organization," Charles White, chair of the board's management resources and compensation committee and its lead independent director, said in a news release.
Sheriff has been recognized as one of Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women three times, and in 2007 was named to the Women's Executive Network Top 100 Women Hall of Fame.
The company said at the same time that it will be part of Bell Mobility's GSM/HPSA cellular network, which will be running by 2010 and parallel the existing Bell Aliant CDMA network.
The Bell Aliant Regional Communications Income Fund also announced that for the third quarter ending Sept. 30 operating revenue hit
$815.3 million, just under a one per cent increase from the year ago period. IT revenue increased by by almost 30 per cent to $15.0 million, while Internet revenue grew 13.6 per cent to $11.7 million. However, local service and long distance revenue declined by $4.9 million (1.4 per cent) and $7.7 million (6.2 per cent) respectively.