Banco Santander has appointed three leading technologists from Goldman Sachs, Amazon and Cognizant to top tier executive positions in support of its digital transformation strategy.
R. Martin Chávez, a 20-year veteran of Goldman Sachs, has been appointed as a new independent director, replacing Esther Giménez-Salinas who will be stepping down having served on the board for eight years.
Chavez, who retired from Goldman in 2019, began his career as a software engineer and founded a number of technology companies in Silicon Valley and New York.
He will also join the remuneration committee; risk supervision, regulation and compliance committee; and innovation and technology committee.
He will be joined at the bank by former Amazon SVP Sebastian Gunningham, who will take on the roles of chairman of Santander Consumer Finance and vice chairman of digital banking subsidiary Openbank.
Gunningham was formerly responsible for the Amazon Marketplace and multiple other technology groups, including overseeing Amazon’s global payments services. During his career, he has also worked at Apple, First Data, Oracle and WeWork.
Finally, Francisco D’Souza, co-founder of Cognizant and a member of Santander's International Advisory Board since 2016 will become the group strategic advisor for the development of Santander Global Platform (SGP), assisting the board in setting up and implementing the strategy and business models of all the existing and new ventures being developed within SGP.
Ana Botín, Banco Santander’s group executive chairman, says: “Marty, Sebastian and Frank bring extensive experience and will add significant value to the group as we develop and execute our digital transformation.”