Intel Hires McAfee Vet As CMO, Names New Federal Business Leader

From 2015 to 2023, new Intel Chief Marketing Officer Brett Hannath served in several marketing leader roles at McAfee and its permutations, such as when the security vendor was owned by the chipmaker and when its enterprise business transformed into a separate company.

Intel has hired a former McAfee executive as its new chief marketing officer and appointed the CEO’s former chief of staff to lead the chipmaker’s federal and defense business.

The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company told CRN last week that it gave the CMO role to Brett Hannath, who held several marketing leadership roles, including interim CMO, for nearly seven years at McAfee while the security vendor was owned by Intel, after a majority stake of the business was sold to a private equity firm in 2017 and during its brief return to the public market.

Most recently, Hannath (pictured above) served as CMO for nearly two years at Trellix, a security vendor formed through the merger of FireEye and McAfee Enterprise in 2021 at the behest of a private equity firm that acquired FireEye’s products business and McAfee’s enterprise business that year.

“Brett’s deep industry and company knowledge, range of leadership and [go-to-market] role experience, and track record of success will make him a great addition to Intel and leading Intel’s marketing function forward,” Intel said in a statement to CRN.

Prior to McAfee, Hannath spent nearly eight years at TIBCO Software in various marketing roles. Subsequently, he was at Intel for more than six years as group manager for business development and alliances in the Australia-New Zealand enterprise market segment.

Hannath started at Intel on Jan. 8, several months after the semiconductor giant introduced a major rebrand for its client processors, which kicked off with the recently launched Core Ultra chips for PCs with advanced AI capabilities.

Three-and-a-half years earlier, Intel went through its largest branding refresh since 2006, with the company’s logo and key brands, such as Core and Xeon, getting new looks. That rebrand campaign was overseen by Intel’s former CMO, Karen Walker, who left the company last February to become an operating partner at Goldman Sachs, according to LinkedIn.

Gelsinger’s Ex-Chief Of Staff Becomes Leader Of Intel Federal

Separately, Intel told CRN on Tuesday that it has named 12-year company veteran Christopher George president and general manager of Intel Federal, the chipmaker’s entity for selling technology solutions to U.S. government and military customers.

Effect Feb. 1, George will take the position from Intel Federal’s current leader, Jim Brinker, who will move to an advisory role until he is expected to retire on March 1.

A part of Intel’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer, Intel Federal provides high-performance computing, AI and 5G network solutions to U.S. government customers as well as secure and advanced chip manufacturing and packaging solutions to military customers.

George will report to Intel Executive Vice President and CTO Greg Lavender, who is also general manager of the Software and Advanced Technology Group.

In a memo to his team, Lavender said George has a “breadth of experience across Intel and a deep understanding of Intel’s operating model,” according to Intel.

George’s experience at Intel started in the Technology Development group, “where he conducted research as a computational materials scientist,” he said in the memo.

“From there, he joined the market intelligence team in Intel’s Data Platforms Group where he developed analytical tools and models to forecast trends across Intel’s data-centric portfolio,” according to Lavender.

George then went on to work in the CEO’s office, first as a research analyst under the leadership of Brian Krzanich and then Bob Swan. He then became the CEO’s chief of staff, first under Swan and subsequently Pat Gelsinger.

Most recently, George was CTO of Intel’s Corporate Strategy and Ventures group, “where he worked closely with Intel Capital to analyze strategic investments and contributed technical expertise to corporate strategic discussions,” Lavender said.

Hannath, George Among Mix Of Big Intel Exec Moves In January

Earlier this month, Intel made appointments for two other critical roles, naming Trevor Vickers its new global channel chief and hiring Hewlett Packard Enterprise executive Justin Hotard as general manager of the prized Data Center and AI Gorup.

Within the Sales, Marketing and Communication Group (SMG), Vickers took over from John Kalvin as general manager of Intel’s General Partners and Support organization, which manages its relationships with value-added resellers, system integrators, managed services providers and other kinds of channel partners through the Intel Partner Alliance program.

In turn, Kalvin, who was Intel’s global channel chief for three years, took on a new role as general manager of Intel’s freshly created Go To Market Operations group within SMG.

Days before the channel chief swap, Intel announced it had hired Hotard to lead its Data Center and AI Group. The role puts Hotard, who most recently led HPE’s HPC and AI business, in charge of Intel’s Xeon server CPU business as well as its nascent AI chip business.

The appointment of new leaders is happening at a critical time for Intel: It’s in the middle of executing on Gelsinger’s ambitious, four-year comeback plan to leapfrog Asian foundry rivals in manufacturing capability. At the same time, Intel is fighting to keep its dominance in the PC and server markets on top of challenging Nvidia in the AI computing space alongside other rivals.