Bowles to succeed Durante

Jack Bowles (pictured), currently COO of British American Tobacco’s international business, is due to succeed Nicandro Durante as the company’s CEO following Durante’s retirement on April 1.
In a note posted on its website, BAT said that Bowles would become chief executive designate on November 1 and would join the Board on January 1.
Bowles joined BAT in 2004 as CEO of BAT France and thereafter became MD of the BAT listed subsidiary in Malaysia. He was appointed to the Management Board of BAT in 2009 as regional director for Western Europe and subsequently served as regional director in both the Americas Region and the Asia-Pacific Region before taking on his current role as COO in 2017.
“Having conducted a far-reaching succession process with strong external and internal candidates, the Board is delighted to appoint such an experienced and dynamic successor from within BAT,” chairman Richard Burrows was quoted as saying. “Throughout his career at BAT, Jack has demonstrated excellent strategic leadership; growing businesses, driving productivity improvements and building strong management teams. In his most recent roles, as director, Asia-Pacific and, as COO, he has played a key role in developing our potentially reduced-risk products business.
“Jack‘s track record of innovating, and his experience across so many different geographies and areas of our business, position him extremely well to build on Nicandro’s achievements and write the next chapter in BAT’s history.”
Meanwhile, Bowles said that he was honored to succeed Durante. “It is an exciting time for BAT with many changes in our industry but also great opportunities,” he was quoted as saying. “With our depth of talent, our iconic brands and our range and pipeline of potentially reduced risk products, I am confident that we will take full advantage of these opportunities as we accelerate the transformation of BAT into a stronger multi category tobacco and nicotine products company.”