Lester Chu is vice president – marketing & strategic planning for Verizon Information Services (VIS), the world’s leading directories publisher (Verizon SuperPages) and producer of the Internet’s #1 online directory and shopping resource, www.superpages.com.

Chu is responsible for developing new and enhanced products for linking advertisers and consumers, both in SuperPages and SuperPages.com; developing brand, advertising and marketing strategies and forecasting the economic and competitive environments.

Before assuming his current position in 2003, Chu served as group vice president – Strategic Planning and was responsible for e-commerce, domestic print and international strategies plus development of Information Services’ print and e-commerce business. He had served in this role since July 2000.

Immediately prior, Chu was assistant vice president - business development for GTE Corporation, where, since 1997, he led a business development team that identified new opportunities, defined strategies and developed go-to-market business plans. As a result, a number of key business initiatives were launched, such as voice over IP, virtual private networks and managed services for IP networks.

Chu’s career with GTE began in 1989 when he joined GTE Hawaiian Tel as a major application specialist. He was promoted in 1991 to regional manager – network application specialist. He moved to GTE Telephone Operations in 1993 as group manager – technology pilots, then moved to GTE Corporation in 1996 as manager – business strategy.

Prior to joining GTE, Chu owned and operated his own company, DP Solutions, a software development firm.