Ernest Cu was Globe Telecom’s president and CEO when TechTimes profiled him on September 2, 2024. That description is now historical: Globe’s 2024 Integrated Report calls 2024 his sixteenth and final year in the role, and the company announced a transition to Carl Raymond R. Cruz in 2025. Cu’s central legacy is the strategic shift he led at Globe—from a traditional telecommunications company toward a wider digital-solutions business, including a major role in the rise of GCash.
Who is Ernest Cu?
Ernest Lawrence L. Cu led Globe Telecom as president and CEO for more than 16 years. Globe’s June 2024 profile described his tenure as already exceeding 16 years; its 2024 Integrated Report later identified that year as his sixteenth and final one in the role. Globe’s profile of Cu and its 2024 Integrated Report provide the company’s account of his tenure.
The 2024 TechTimes profile also describes Cu’s earlier work leading SPi Technologies from 1997 to 2008 and attributes engineering and MBA degrees to him. Those details are reported in the profile, but the available corporate sources cited here do not independently verify them. The safer basis for understanding his Globe leadership is the record of the company’s strategic and organizational changes during his tenure.
Globe’s own profile presents Cu as a relationship-oriented, people-first leader who values empathy and adaptability. That is a self-described leadership portrait, rather than an independently measured assessment. It helps explain how the company frames his approach, but it does not by itself establish the cause of Globe’s performance.
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How did Cu change Globe?
Under Cu, Globe increasingly described itself not only as a connectivity provider but as a digital-solutions platform. That meant keeping telecom infrastructure at the center while expanding into financial technology, enterprise services, digital ventures, and technology-enabled customer operations. Globe credits this transformation to a portfolio that included GCash, 917Ventures, and Kickstart Ventures. These businesses and initiatives are related to Globe’s strategy, but they are not interchangeable with Globe Telecom itself.
GCash and digital finance
GCash is operated by Mynt, a fintech business in the Globe group ecosystem. Its importance to Globe’s strategy was that mobile connectivity could serve as a route to payments and other financial services, rather than only voice, messaging, and internet access. Globe’s 2024 Integrated Report described GCash as a US$5 billion unicorn. That is the valuation cited by the company in that report, not a statement of Globe Telecom’s own market value or a permanent current valuation.
For users, mobile financial services can make payments and some financial transactions accessible without relying exclusively on physical branches. But access to an app is not the same as full financial inclusion: people still need a suitable device, reliable connectivity, digital skills, an accepted identity, and confidence that their money and personal information are safe. Globe’s account of GCash’s inclusion aims is a statement of company strategy, not independent proof that those barriers have been resolved nationwide. Globe’s article on its digital-future goals describes the company’s stated ambitions.
Building and funding digital ventures
Globe used 917Ventures to develop digital platforms and Kickstart Ventures to invest in businesses and ecosystems. The strategic logic was to extend the company’s capabilities beyond its core network business and participate in adjacent digital markets. This approach may create new sources of growth and services, but it also means judging Globe’s broader digital strategy requires distinguishing the parent company from its separate ventures, investments, and partners.
Enterprise services and operations
Globe’s expansion also included services for businesses and the use of data and automation inside its operations. The company says it has applied artificial intelligence to financial-services credit scoring, network optimization, and operational automation. Globe’s AI announcement outlines those applications. These uses show how a telecom operator can apply technology both to customer-facing services and to running its network; the announcement does not, by itself, quantify the resulting improvements.
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What did the strategy mean for Filipinos?
The potential public benefit was broader than faster or more convenient telecom services. Globe’s strategy linked connectivity to mobile payments, merchant tools, online services, and digital literacy. The company has also promoted services such as KonsultaMD and initiatives intended to help groups, including older adults, participate in a more digital society. Its #SeniorDigizen campaign coverage presents digital literacy as increasingly important as services move online.
These are meaningful avenues for access, but they do not settle whether digital enablement is equitable or dependable. A person without affordable data, a compatible device, adequate signal, or the skills to spot a scam may remain excluded even when a service exists. Digital financial and other essential services also bring risks involving fraud, account takeovers, privacy, outages, fees, and reliance on private platforms. A serious assessment therefore has to ask not only how many services are available, but who can use them safely and consistently.
Globe has described digital technology as a potential lifeline and highlighted GCash services, its merchant network, and inclusion goals. Those claims are best understood as the company’s rationale and intended impact, not as independent evidence of nationwide outcomes. Globe’s account of its digital-future strategy sets out that framing.
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What business results accompanied the transformation?
Globe reported ₱165 billion in service revenues for 2024, a company-reported record and a 2% increase year over year. It attributed growth especially to mobile and corporate data. In its 2024 results coverage, Globe also reported growth in fixed-wired subscribers and said GFiber Prepaid had reached 260,000 subscribers. These figures describe the company’s reported performance; they do not prove that Cu alone caused the results or that revenue growth translated into universal access.
Globe’s 2024 revenue announcement and its 2024 financial-performance overview provide the company’s reporting and context. Network investment, employees, customers, partners, regulators, market conditions, and the wider Ayala ecosystem all form part of the setting in which those results were achieved.
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What was Cu’s role beyond Globe?
In November 2024, Globe announced that it had been elected to the GSMA board for the January 2025–December 2026 term, with Cu representing the company. The announcement came while he was still Globe’s president and CEO; it should not be read as evidence that he remained CEO throughout that board term. The GSMA role connected Globe’s leadership to international discussions involving mobile technology, interoperability, standards, and digital inclusion. Globe’s announcement of the GSMA election describes the appointment.
When did Cu leave the CEO role?
Globe announced in October 2024 that Carl Raymond R. Cruz would become deputy CEO effective January 1, 2025, and would be nominated as president and CEO at the 2025 annual stockholders’ meeting. The company said Cu was expected to remain CEO until that meeting and then retain chairmanships connected with Globe’s venture and infrastructure businesses. Its 2024 Integrated Report subsequently described 2024 as Cu’s sixteenth and final year as president and CEO. Globe’s leadership announcement sets out the transition plan.
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1Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute2Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors3Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesHow should Cu’s legacy be assessed?
Cu was a central architect of Globe’s move toward digital services, with GCash and venture building among the most visible parts of that strategy. Globe’s reports document the company’s own view of the transformation and its business results. They do not establish that every outcome was attributable to Cu personally, nor do they settle the broader questions of affordability, rural connectivity, consumer protection, privacy, or competition.
The 2025 leadership handoff makes continuity the key test. Globe’s digital-platform strategy will have to demonstrate that it can keep producing useful services and durable business results under new leadership, while addressing the barriers and risks that corporate growth figures cannot measure on their own. The September 2024 TechTimes profile remains a snapshot of Cu as CEO at that time; it should be read alongside the later transition and performance disclosures.
Read the original TechTimes profile, published September 2, 2024.
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