12.12.2017

New COO for Ashtead

Ashtead is promoting Brendan Horgan to the post of group chief operating officer with effect from the start of the new year.

Horgan joined the company’s US operation Sunbelt in 1996 and was was promoted to chief executive of Sunbelt with a seat on the Ashtead board in January 2011. In his new role he will retain his day to day responsibilities at Sunbelt, but will also work alongside Geoff Drabble on the operational and strategic development of the wider group as part of the group’s succession plans.
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Brendan Horgan

The company has also announced the retirement of chairman Chris Cole next year, he has been Ashtead’s chairman since 2007 prior to which he was a non-executive director. The process to recruit a new chairman has begun, with the aim of affecting an orderly handover at the Annual General Meeting in September 2018.
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Chris Cole

Chief executive Geoff Drabble said: "I would like to congratulate Brendan on his well deserved promotion. I look forward to working with him on the ongoing delivery of our successful strategy to grow the group through a combination of organic growth and acquisitions. There will be plenty of time next year to thank Chris for his significant contribution to the board and to the group over a number of years and for overseeing what has been a period of significant progress for the business as we have grown into one of the largest and most successful rental companies in the world."

At the same time Ashtead has announced its firs £1 billion quarter with revenues rising just over 20 percent to £1.01 billion a new record. Pre-tax profits improved 12.5 percent to £264 million. More on the results later this morning.

Vertikal Comment

This looks like solid forward planning from Ashtead as its progress continues, the company is currently going through a golden period and appears to be well set for this to continue with a solid progression plan.
More comment with the results analysis.