Ford hires Apple, Nike and Burberry alum to lead global branding efforts

Ford has picked up a new executive with a strong history of success in marketing and communications across a range of verticals; the automaker announced today that Musa Tariq will join as vice president and chief brand officer at the company, acting as the senior-most creative and strategic branding employee at the company across its global operations. Tariq will join Ford on January 30, coming most recently from Apple, where he was the company’s Global Marketing and Communication director for Retail.

Prior to Apple, Tariq was senior director of social media and community at Nike, and before that he was Burberry’s first-ever social media lead. His unique blend of experiences should set him up well for Ford, since he has exposure on the fashion and lifestyle side, and plenty of tech perspective from his time at Apple. Automakers have always used lifestyle as a key messaging mode for their branding efforts, but the tech portion is relatively new to their approach – and yet increasingly important.

Tariq will report to both Ford’s EVP of Global marketing Sales and Service Stephen Odell, and to its group vice president for communications Ray Day, but the carmaker is clearly hoping to inject some fresh perspective into its branding efforts by bringing in a young exec like Tariq in such a senior role with such a broad mandate.