The Board of East African Breweries Limited (“EABL”) has on Friday announced that Andrew Cowan, who has been serving as an alternate director to Nick Blasquez at the EABL Board, will be taking over as the new Managing Director with effect from 28th, July this year.
Mr. Cowan is a consummate business leader, with a wide range of commercial and strategic management experience spanning over 20 years in the FMCG sector and is currently the Country Director for Diageo Great Britain (GB).
A British national, Mr. Cowan’s experience straddles corporate leadership, strategy development, operational management as well as sales and marketing. He joined Diageo in 2008 as Commercial Director for Northern Ireland and was appointed to the role of Commercial Director in the Republic of Ireland a year later
He returned to Great Britain in 2011 and has led the Diageo commercial business since then. Before joining Diageo, Andrew had a number of senior roles in the FMCG industry, including positions held at GlaxoSmithKline and Boots Plc.
Mr. Ireland is taking up a new role in Diageo’s global business as General Manager Great Britain, Ireland and France.
EABL Group Board Chairman Charles Muchene said: “We are certainly pleased to have Mr. Cowan at EABL, as an established global business leader in the FMCG business. We see him bringing in a lot of expertise and commercial leadership which will be a good fit for the business. This will help us consolidate on the good progress and solid foundation that we have built over the years, to realise our ambition of becoming the best performing, most trusted and respected consumer Products Company on the continent.”
Subsequently, Mr. Muchene thanked Mr. Ireland for his immense contribution to EABL during his 3-year stint at the helm.
He said: “During Mr. Ireland’s time, EABL has become one of the best performing markets in Diageo and the fastest growing market for Guinness. Sustainable development performance has also significantly improved, as evidenced by local material sourcing which increased from 45% to over 80%, delivering economic benefits for EABL a nd over 32,000 East African farmers. EABL has been recognised number 2 ‘best place to work’ in Africa by Deloitte and a great deal of work has gone into the environment stewardship agenda.
