Dannon CEO Lozano assumes leadership of Horizon, Earthbound organic brands
Source: Sustainable Food News
October 20, 2017
Danone S.A. said Lorna Davis has been replaced as CEO of its new DanoneWave subsidiary, which runs the Horizon organic dairy, Wallaby organic yogurt, and Earthbound Farm organic produce brands.
Paris, France-based Danone (OTCQX:DANOY), the world's largest yogurt maker with annual sales of €22 billion ($24 billion), formed DanoneWave by combining its North American dairy operations, which largely included its Dannon brand, with the operations of The WhiteWave Foods Company, which it acquired in April for $12.5 billion.
The new subsidiary doubles the size of Danone's North American business to more than $6 billion in annual sales, making it the leading refrigerated dairy company, excluding cheese.
Danone had reported a 2.2 percent drop in third quarter sales for DanoneWave on Tuesday, saying it had been wrestling with certain trends in the United States during the quarter, including a need to expand leadership.
On Wednesday, Danone had announced that as part of an executive committee shake-up, Francisco "Paco" Camacho would lead its Essential Dairy and Plant-Based (EDP) International business, including DanoneWave in North America.
In an email to Sustainable Food News on Friday, Thomas Antoine, Danone's corporate PR manager, said that Mariano Lozano, CEO of White Plains, N.Y.-based Danone subsidiary The Dannon Company, Inc., the largest U.S. yogurt business under the Dannon, Oikos and Activia brands, among others, has assumed the role of CEO of DanoneWave.
Lozano now leads DanoneWave, which operates from the former WhiteWave headquarters in Broomfield, Colo., under Camacho's leadership.
Davis, who had been appointed CEO of DanoneWave in February, is now serving as senior advisor to CEO and Chairman Emmanual Faber, Antoine said.