Leaseweb has appointed Estelle Azemard as Chief Executive Officer of Leaseweb Canada, bringing 16 years of cloud industry experience to lead the company's next growth phase as Canadian enterprises navigate increasingly complex data sovereignty and AI infrastructure requirements.
Azemard, who will be based in Montreal, takes over as Canadian organisations are reconsidering their infrastructure strategies — not as a move away from cloud, but toward more deliberate choices about where workloads sit and who controls the underlying infrastructure.
"Canadian organisations are looking at infrastructure differently today than they were even a few years ago," Azemard said. "The conversation has morphed and it is no longer simply about moving everything to the biggest cloud provider. It's about choice. It's about flexibility and freedom. It's about data sovereignty. And, it's about making sure critical infrastructure decisions align with both business and IT priorities."
Leaseweb operates as a sovereign hybrid cloud and Infrastructure as a Service provider, with a product mix covering sovereign cloud, dedicated servers, colocation, and hybrid infrastructure. The Canada operation is one of a number of regional entities under the Leaseweb global group, which is headquartered in Amsterdam.
Co-CEO Lex Boost cited Azemard's combination of technical depth and awareness of the economic and regulatory forces reshaping cloud decisions in Canada as key to the appointment. AI adoption, compliance requirements, and geopolitical considerations around data residency have all contributed to higher enterprise interest in alternatives to hyperscaler-only strategies, particularly among organisations in regulated sectors.
Azemard's appointment takes effect immediately.
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