Myer has announced that a possible Initial Public Offering (IPO) of its shares may occur this year, due to this Bill Wavish has decided to stand down from his role as executive chairman and director of Myer, effective immediately.
In a statement supplied to the ASX, Myer has announced that due to an improved performance across the business and continued strength of sales and profit performance in the fourth quarter, it will begin a review process that may result in an IPO in the near term.
Wavish has decided to step down from his role in the company due to the fact that the review process will require a long-term commitment to the next phase of the company’s re-emergence.
Bernie Brookes, Myer CEO, said that Wavish will still contribute to the organisation.
“Bill will retain an office in Myer Sydney and will continue to make a major contribution to the store improvement programme covering service, efficiency, presentation and rostering involving all in-store projects,” he said.
“While he has elected to scale back from his full time commitment it has been mutually agreed that he will be retained in a non-executive capacity for a further twelve months as a consultant to Myer management.”
In light of this, Howard McDonald has been appointed as non executive chairman of Myer. McDonald has had a direct association with the Myer business over the past three years and has worked as a director closely with Wavish and Brookes throughout this time.
McDonald thanked Wavish for his involvement in the company.
“I want to thank Bill for his tremendous contribution to the Myer business to date. We are fortunate to be able to continue to have his input particularly on in-store improvement opportunities but also more generally from a retail perspective across the business,” said McDonald.
Whilst the review process has commenced any decision to list will be made by TPG Capital, The Myer Family Company and Blum Capital.