Asos new directors include former Burberry exec and Ocado boss

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Oct 2, 2019

Asos has had its challenges in recent periods and its share price has suffered, but the shares rose on Wednesday morning after the company said it has beefed up its board with a raft of key non-executive director appointments.

Most significant from a fashion viewpoint is Eugenia Ulasewicz, who was President of Americas for Burberry Group from 1998-2013 and previously held senior retail positions with Bloomingdale's, Galeries Lafayette and Saks Fifth Avenue. She currently holds non-executive roles with Bunzl, Signet Jewellers, Vince Holding, and Hudson Group is joining the board in April next year.

In the UK, the highest-profile among the new appointees is Luke Jensen, who has been CEO of Ocado Solutions since 2017 and who’s also on the tech firm/grocery delivery specialist’s board. He was previously Senior Advisor at Boston Consulting Group and Group Development Director at Sainsbury’s, where he was responsible for online and all customer-facing digital activities. He joins the Asos board as of November 1.

Also joining is Karen Geary, who has extensive experience in the technology industry following senior roles at Micro Focus International, Wandisco and The Sage Group. She’s joining on December 1.

And the last of the four is Mai Fyfield who was Chief Commercial and Strategy Officer at Sky, and currently serves as a non-executive director on the Boards of Roku, the NASDAQ-listed TV streaming platform, BBC Commercial Holdings Limited, and Nationwide Building Society. Fyfield joins at the same time as Jensen.

Asos said the new members mark the expansion of the board to reflect the firm’s increased size and scale and the take up of positions to be vacated by current non-executive directors Hilary Riva and Rita Clifton, who both come to the end of their six-year tenures in April 2020.