Meltwater, a leading global provider of social, media and consumer intelligence, announces the appointment of Chris Hackney as Chief Product Officer.

In this pivotal role, Chris will lead Meltwater’s product organization and spearhead the strategic direction, expansion, and operation of the company’s product portfolio, with the needs of Meltwater’s customers at the heart of this strategy.

Hackney joins Meltwater with over 25 years in technology and a proven track record of driving innovation and growth for B2B SaaS companies, developing and executing product strategies and managing cross-functional teams. Throughout his career, Hackney has built and exited several pioneering companies at the leading edge of emerging fields; the first of which was Virtue, an early pioneer in social SaaS, which was acquired by Oracle. His time leading Oracle’s Customer Success organization was followed by subsequent executive positions at Trendkite, a PR/Communications innovator that exited to Cision, where he spent three years heading up global Product Management, and Mercury Healthcare, a healthcare CRM leader that exited to WebMD. Most recently he founded AI Guardian, an AI Governance and Compliance SaaS solution, to ensure that organizations have the tools they need to implement Responsible AI and mitigate the complexities and risks of generative AI.

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At Meltwater, Hackney will lead the execution of a product vision that is in harmony with Meltwater’s core business objectives including industry-leading innovation and a customer-centric approach to product design. He will lead Meltwater’s product teams to develop cutting edge solutions that solve the biggest needs of the company’s 27,000 customers world-wide.

“I’m truly honored to join the amazing team at Meltwater. This is more than a new chapter in my professional journey; it’s an opportunity to contribute to an organization that’s not just shaping the future of media and social intelligence but is also passionately committed to empowering businesses around the world. Innovation stems from deeply understanding and delivering on the customer experience and I look forward to working with our teams in engaging with our customers, learning from them, and ensuring our products continue to set benchmarks for excellence and impact in the industry,” said Hackney.

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“We’re thrilled to bring Chris on board to lead product development and create even more value for our customers. He has a proven track record of driving growth through product innovation and delivering exceptional solutions for customers, and he will be a huge asset for us as we look to further elevate our media, social and consumer intelligence solutions,” said John Box, CEO of Meltwater.