Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana Appoints Two Vice Presidents to Information Technology Leadership Team

March 29, 2019

BATON ROUGE – Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana has appointed two vice presidents, Prashanth Cannanbilla and David Yoo, to its collaborative IT leadership team. Cannanbilla joined the state’s largest health insurer March 4 as vice president, Strategic Program Management, and Yoo started March 18 as vice president, Digital and Enterprise Services. 

Reporting to Blue Cross Chief Information Officer Sue Kozik, Cannanbilla will focus on strategic program management, supporting and operationalizing new projects and partnerships. He will support partners throughout the organization with the due diligence and transition planning that new partnerships and projects and other complex deals require. 

Yoo will direct enterprise architecture at the executive level and will also report to Kozik. Leading teams, handling multiple enterprise-wide tools and developing partnerships with vendors, he will ensure that IT’s work supports company strategy and gives key departments a smooth and productive customer experience.

“The bottom line is that two industry-recognized leaders with extensive experience in healthcare IT are on our team,” Kozik said. “I am thrilled, knowing what these two men bring to Blue Cross.”

Cannanbilla comes to Blue Cross from F.N.B. Corporation, where he was senior vice president and head of data governance and management. Before F.N.B. Corporation, he was senior director IT at Highmark, Inc. He has held a series of increasingly responsible positions in business strategy, technology management and data governance throughout his career.

Cannanbilla earned his master’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, at the University of Pittsburgh. He earned a Master of Business Administration degree, Strategy, at the Katz School of Business at the University of Pittsburgh. He is a member and Certified Project Management Professional of the Project Management Institute and a member of Beta Gamma Sigma, the honor society for collegiate schools of business. He also holds the Health Insurance Associate and the Managed Healthcare Professional designations from AHIP.

Yoo brings to Blue Cross more than 25 years of senior-level IT and digital leadership experience. He has a track record of using strategy and structure to achieve desired business results. He has held IT management positions at Carlson Companies and Best Buy in Minnesota, Kaiser Permanente, NantHealth and Encore Capital Group in California, and Bank of America in North Carolina. 

At Best Buy, he was chief architect for the company’s supply chain, and at Kaiser Permanente—the nation’s largest not-for-profit HMO, with $49B in annual revenue—Yoo was responsible for delivering enterprise-level architecture and digital and mobile technology tied to the company’s business and technology strategy.

Yoo studied biology at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and completed the Executive Leadership Program at the University of Minnesota, Graduate School of Management.

About Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana is committed to our mission to improve the health and lives of Louisianians. We invest both time and money in the communities we serve, supporting the health and wellbeing of Louisianians through more than 200 charitable organizations.

With our subsidiaries, HMO Louisiana and Southern National Life, we provide group and individual health insurance plans, life and disability insurance, group voluntary products and administrative services to one out of four Louisiana residents. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana also provides Medicare supplement and Medicare Advantage plans and is a partner in offering the Healthy Blue Medicaid managed care plan. Louisiana is the only state where we operate, with offices in every major region to serve our customers.

Founded in New Orleans in 1934, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana is a tax-paying nonprofit health insurer. We are a private mutual company, owned by our policyholders, with an independent Louisiana Board of Directors and no shareholders. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.

To learn more, visit our website at bcbsla.com