Background
Born on 7 April 1963 in Frederikstad, Svendsen grew up in Kråkerøy, an island in the south-east of Norway.
engineer executive vice president
Born on 7 April 1963 in Frederikstad, Svendsen grew up in Kråkerøy, an island in the south-east of Norway.
After demonstrating interest in mathematics and physics at high school, in 1983 she went to Trondheim to spend five enjoyable years studying civil engineering at the Norwegian Institute of Technology where she earned an Master of Science in electronics. She completed her education in 1995 with a master"s degree in technology management from the Norwegian Institute of Technology in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
As of September 2015, she is a vice president of the Telenor Group and head of Telenor Norway. In 1988, she joined Telenor as a research scientist, attracted by the potential of telecommunications and the internet. After completing her masters at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, Massachusetts, she was promoted first to head of department and later to head of division for data services at Telenor Nett.
In 1999, she was given special responsibility for Telenor"s Fixed-Mobile Convergence project which quickly led to her appointment in 2000 as technology director for all of Telenor"s departments, a post she held for the next five years.
In 2005, she became Vice President and Head of Telenor Nordic Fixed. In 2008, she spent a short period as Chief Executive Officer of Conax which at the time was owned by Telenor.
She returned to Telenor in September 2011 as Executive Vice President Telenor Group and Chief Executive Officer of Telenor Norway, a position she continues to hold. Svendsen also serves on the boards of the banking and financial services group Diplomate of National Board (since 2011) and (since 2007) EMGS which provides technical support to oil and gas companies.
Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences]
From 2002 to 2007, Svendsen was a member of the European Commission"s ISTAG, an advisory group on information society technologies.