San Francisco, Sep 30 (IANS): Facebook has promoted Alex Schultz, Vice President of product growth and analytics, as its global CMO.

Schultz will fill the position left open by Antonio Lucio, who joined the company from HP Inc in 2018 and left the company to "dedicate 100 per cent of my time to diversity, inclusion and equity".

"I am super proud to be Facebook's next CMO. Lucio has left huge shoes and a great team behind and I'm really excited to get stuck in with them," Schultz said in a Facebook post on Tuesday.

"I also hope to deepen the strategic impact that Lucio made in focusing on building trust and value across our portfolio of brands".

Lucio's departure came at a time when Facebook is preparing steps to tackle fake news and misinformation ahead of the US presidential election in November.

Lucio was reporting to Facebook Chief Product Officer Chris Cox and was part of Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg's leadership team.

Schultz said that billions of people have connected with family and friends socially online while staying physically apart and slowing the spread of the virus.

"At the same time I think scrutiny of any new technology is appropriate and there are ways we can, and should, improve without losing all the good," he said.