Microsoft Veteran Kathleen Hall Exits Amid Marketing Team Overhaul

Microsoft chief brand officer Kathleen Hall is stepping down after 16 years with the business, continuing an era of flux for the tech giant’s marketing team as it lays the foundations for a “new era of artificial intelligence.”

In a LinkedIn post, Hall—who also served as corporate vice president of brand, advertising and research—said she would relocate from Redmond, Wash., to her home state of New York to take some time off before her “next adventure.”

Hall is credited with launching Windows 7.8 and 10 and Microsoft’s Surface and Cloud products. She was also the executive behind the brand’s first national Super Bowl ad, holiday campaigns and its National Football League and National Basketball Association partnerships.

Microsoft chief marketing officer Takeshi Numoto confirmed the news in a memo seen by ADWEEK, outlining other changes to the marketing department. These include:

• Xbox CMO Jerret West is also departing to join Roblox. The console’s current vp of integrated marketing, Kirsten Ward, will now lead a newly unified gaming marketing team.

• Global creative, advertising, branding and operations teams will be bundled under the leadership of consumer CMO Yusuf Mehdi. Mehdi will work closely with Stephanie Ferguson, who oversees Microsoft’s centralized global sales and marketing engine.

• As Microsoft gears up for a cookieless landscape, Numoto hired Google exec Bryson Gordon as a corporate vp to lead its global media, partnerships and agency management efforts.

• The brand has “realigned” its events, studios and communities team: 26-year veteran Vivian Eickhoff will lead event production and studios, while Alyssa Schutter will join from Amazon Studios to lead event creative experiences.

U.K. CMO Bonnie Pelosi was also recently promoted to EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) CMO.

So what’s going on at Microsoft?

Numoto took over the CMO job after Chris Capossela left the post in October 2023, following a 32-year run.

At the time, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said the company was gearing up for a “new era of AI.”

Microsoft has been pouring investment into generative AI to power its growth. In January 2023, the company invested $13 billion in AI startup OpenAI, home to hit product ChatGPT. It has also been spending big on its cloud division, integrating AI across its software and services via its Copilot chatbot.

In April 2024, the company’s heavy bets paid off when it beat Wall Street expectations, increasing its quarterly revenues by 17% year-over-year to $61.86 billion.

On the latest changes, Numoto told staff: “[These] will help us continue to lead the AI platform shift. Heading into fiscal year 2025, we will rally around Copilot, Copilot+ PC, and the Copilot Stack as the AI platform framework that will catalyze the reinvention of our offerings across our broad portfolio and reinvigorate the Microsoft brand.”

Microsoft reclaimed the top spot as the world’s most valuable company by market capital at the start of 2024, overtaking technology rival Apple.