I’m thrilled to welcome Sunil Abraham as Mozilla Foundation’s new VP, Leadership Programs. Sunil joins us from The Centre for Internet and Society, the most recent chapter in a 20 year career of developing free and open source software and an open internet agenda.

During our search we stated a goal of finding someone with “deep experience working on some aspect of internet health; and a proven track record building high impact organizations and teams.” In Sunil we have managed to find just that. An engineer by training, much of Sunil’s research and policy work has deep technical grounding. For example one of his current projects is doing a human rights review of various Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standards with Article 19. He has also founded and run two organizations: Mahiti, a non-profit software development shop; and The Centre for Internet and Society, a policy and technology think tank in Bangalore. Sunil is truly ‘of the movement’ and is perfectly positioned to help us build a strong cadre of internet health leaders all around the world.

Our global community is the linchpin in our strategy to grow a movement to create a healthier digital world. In this role, Sunil will head up the programs that bring people from around the world into our work — the Internet Health Report, MozFest, our fellowships and awards — with the aim of supporting people who want to take a leadership role in this community. In addition to a great passion for Mozilla’s mission and issues, Sunil also brings a tremendous amount of experience working on this kind of leadership development. He’s worked closely with Ashoka and the Open Society Foundation in developing leaders for many years. And, notably, the Centre for Internet and Society has been a home for many of the key players in India’s open internet space.

Sunil is starting out immediately as an advisor to Mozilla’s executive team and directors, working a few hours per week. He will move to Berlin and start full time in his new role in January 2019. We will be planning a community town hall to welcome Sunil to our community and give everyone a chance to connect with him. Look for more in September.