Chris Howarth is now the Chief Executive Officer of Avanade. This change happens on February 3 2026. Chris Howarth taking over as the Chief Executive Officer is a deal for Avanade. Avanade is a company that helps people with IT and other services. Chris Howarth will be, in charge of Avanade. Help the company grow and come up with new ideas.

Howarth is taking over for Rodrigo Caserta. Rodrigo Caserta is leaving after being with Avanades leadership team for than 11 years.

During his time at Avanade Rodrigo Caserta helped the company work closely with partners and he helped Avanade get into the business of using artificial intelligence to change the way companies work digitally.

Now Rodrigo Caserta is going to work at Microsoft as Corporate Vice President for Medium Enterprises & Channel, in the Americas. This shows that Avanade and Microsoft are getting closer and closer. Avanade and Microsoft are working together more and more.

The decision shows that Avanade is staying on the path with its long term plan. At the time Avanade is putting more energy into using new ideas in artificial intelligence, cloud services and solutions for big companies. In his position Howarth will still be in charge of Avanades relationship with Microsoft. This is very important for Avanade because the company is really good, at using Microsoft technologies and this is a part of what Avanade does.

Before he became the CEO at Avanade Howarth worked at Accenture for than 28 years. He did a lot of work at Accenture. Recently he was a leader, in the Accenture-Microsoft Business Group. His job was to make sure Accenture and Microsoft worked well together to make things and help clients. This was all part of a team that included Avanade, Accenture and Microsoft. Howarth focused on making Avanade, Accenture and Microsoft successful together.

Chris has a lot of experience with Avanade he really understands how Accenture and Microsoft work together and he is a leader said Manish Sharma, Chief Strategy and Services Officer at Accenture and Chair of the Board of Directors at Avanade.

Manish Sharma said that having Chris as the person in charge will mean that Avanade can keep doing what it is doing and make sure its plans keep moving forward. This will help Avanade do what it is supposed to do which is to help its clients change the way they do things using technology Avanades mission is to deliver digital transformation, for its clients.

Howarth is really excited about his job. He knows that Caserta and the rest of the leadership team did a job setting things up.

Howarth said that he feels lucky to be the CEO of Avanade. He wants to keep building on the foundation that Rodrigo and the leadership team made.

Rodrigo was a leader for Avanade and now that he is moving to Microsoft it will make the partnership, between Avanade and Microsoft even stronger. I am really looking forward to working with our people and our clients and our partners at this time. The Artificial Intelligence has a lot of potential to change things and help us get value. We will use the Artificial Intelligence to make changes and get results faster.

Avanade was started in the year 2000. It was an effort between Accenture and Microsoft. Over time Avanade has become one of the companies that provide business solutions based on Microsoft. The company works with than 7,000 clients all around the world. Avanade delivers solutions for things like moving to the cloud making old systems modern adding Artificial Intelligence to businesses and creating experience platforms, for Avanade clients.

Howarth’s appointment reflects an emphasis on sustained technology leadership and strategic collaboration within one of the largest global ecosystems focused on Microsoft-powered transformation. His deep experience across cloud, AI, and enterprise consulting positions him to lead Avanade into its next era of innovation and client impact.