Meet Apple's Newest Director: Andrea Jung

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on January 07

Word from Apple HQ is that the company has elected a new director: Andrea Jung who is Chairman and CEO of Avon Products, the $8.7 billion (2006 sales) cosmetics concern. Jung is an interesting choice. She speaks fluent Mandarin, and sits on the board of General Electric. Before joining Avon in 1994, she worked for retailer Nieman Marcus, and as a graduate of Princeton University sits on that instituation’s board of trustees.

Nanette Byrnes profiled Jung’s tenure at Avon in the March 12 issue of the magazine. It was her first extensive interview since Avon hit a speed-bump in 2005 that it appears to be recovering from. Jung also sat for a Q-and-A with Diane Brady in 2002.

What does Jung bring to the table at Apple? Experience building and maintaining a powerful and storied brand, but also expanding it internationally in up-and-coming markets. As you’ll read in the March 12 profile, Jung has seen close up what happens when expansion into international markets goes right and when it goes wrong. I think that one of Apple’s important strategic imperatives for 2008 and beyond will be to beef up sales of its computers outside North America, and I think China will be an important market. The first Apple Store in China will open in Beijing this year, and that will go a long way toward exposing that country’s growing consumer class to the Apple brand. Jung’s insight will come in handy. And? GE is the parent of NBC Universal, one of the media companies irritating Apple of late. Valleywag suggests one good roll Jung may be called upon to play: Peacemaker.

Oh yeah: As Gruber points out, Jung will also be the only woman on Apple’s board.

Update: Someone asked if Jung is the first woman to sit on Apple’s board ever. The answer is no. Katherine M. Hudson, now a director at Swedish Telecom concern Ericsson — bio here — served as an Apple director from 1994 to 1997, according to old proxy statements. Hudson had been an executive at Eastman Kodak, and at the time was president and CEO of a company called W.H. Brady Co., now Brady Worldwide, a unit of Brady Corp.

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