Reckitt Benckiser CEO Kapoor to retire by end of 2019

Reuters 

By Noor Zainab Hussain

The maker of Durex condoms and Enfamil infant formula said it had started a formal process to appoint Kapoor's successor and was looking at internal and external candidates.

Kapoor, who took over as in September 2011, had a long-stated plan to transform Reckitt from a British maker of into a global leader in

In 2017, the company spent $17 billion buying U.S. The deal took Reckitt into a new area of baby formula and dramatically boosted its presence in fast-growing markets such as

" ... I believe now is a good time for new leadership to take this great company through the next phase of outperformance. I will remain fully focused on driving the business until a successor is in place," Kapoor said on Wednesday.

Last year, the company started to gather momentum after two years of disappointing results caused by a failed product launch, a cyber attack and a safety scandal in

However, a at a Dutch factory producing baby milk hurt Reckitt Benckiser's third-quarter sales in October.

"Kapoor's departure could signal the start of plans to formally split the businesses into two separate entities. This could make either or both of the two businesses more attractive to prospective third parties," said.

Reckitt said in 2017 it would split into two divisions -- and home and

Waldschmidt, who has a "buy" rating on Reckitt, also said Wednesday's announcement would bring new interest to the shares.

Reckitt shares dipped 1.5 percent and were among top fallers on the blue-chip index in early trade.

The stock has almost doubled in value under Kapoor's leadership, giving it a market value of 44.3 billion pounds ($57.1 billion).

Kapoor did not respond to a request for further comment on the professional networking site

Based in the English town of Slough, Reckitt's revenue grew from 9.49 billion pounds in 2011 to 11.51 billion pounds for the year ended December 2017.

($1 = 0.7764 pounds)

(Reporting by in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta and David Evans)

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First Published: Wed, January 16 2019. 14:04 IST