Delivering on its commitment to sustainable growth, Albemarle Corporation (NYSE: ALB) announced that it will realign its global business units, effective January 1, 2014. The new organizational structure is designed to increase customer focus, enhance innovation and accelerate growth.
The company's assets will be aligned within two global business units (GBUs). The Performance Chemicals GBU will include Fire Safety Solutions, Specialty Chemicals and Fine Chemistry Services, consolidating the company's bromine, mineral and custom manufacturing assets under one business unit. The Catalyst Solutions GBU will include Refinery Catalyst Solutions, Performance Catalyst Solutions and Antioxidants. Each GBU will have a dedicated team of sales, R&D, process engineering, manufacturing and sourcing, and business strategy personnel and will have full accountability for improving execution through greater asset and market focus, agility and responsiveness. The new structure will also facilitate the continued standardization of business processes across the organization as part of the company's ongoing One Albemarle strategy.
Matt Juneau will serve as senior vice president of Albemarle Corporation and president of Performance Chemicals. Mr. Juneau has over thirty years' experience in the chemical industry and has held leadership positions across all of the Albemarle businesses and global sales during his career with the company.
D. Michael Wilson will serve as senior vice president of Albemarle Corporation and president of Catalyst Solutions. Mr. Wilson recently joined Albemarle after leaving FMC Corporation where he served as president of the Specialty Chemicals Group.
Dr. Ronald Zumstein will serve as senior vice president, Manufacturing, Supply Chain and Process Excellence. In this expanded role, Dr. Zumstein will lead the supply chain, corporate engineering and LEAN teams and will also partner with the GBU presidents to drive global manufacturing and sourcing excellence. In his over 20 years with Albemarle, Dr. Zumstein has excelled in a wide variety of positions across manufacturing, health and safety, and R&D.
"Today's announcement reflects our commitment to grow in a sustainable manner through increased focus on our bromine and catalyst franchises," stated Luke Kissam, Albemarle's chief executive officer. "The new structure will enable us to more rapidly develop and commercialize new applications for bromine, protect and grow our flame retardants business and more aggressively expand our catalyst business into new markets. The leaner management structure will enable faster decision-making while allowing us to redeploy resources to R&D, business development and sales to help accelerate our growth, with a longer-term goal of increasing R&D spending to approximately 4% of sales. I am pleased to have Matt and Michael serving as leaders of the GBUs and to have Ron leading our drive towards manufacturing and supply chain excellence. I am confident that their experience, shared vision for our company and proven ability to execute will enable us to achieve our goals."