Synlait realigns senior team

Dr Penno says the appointment follows a decision to combine the previously separate ingredient and nutritional sales teams in order to better serve its customers.

"Over the past year we have made significant business development progress particularly with our tier one multinational customers," says Dr Penno.

"We are increasingly selling a range of products to them and we need to provide a single point of contact to better manage these relationships. The change to the senior team structure will also increase accountability and reduce operating complexity for us going forward."

Lee will oversee the sales function for the company. He has over 15 years dairy industry experience in business development and sales roles in New Zealand, Asia and Europe, and takes up the position after being with Synlait Milk for almost three years in the position of general manager ingredient sales.

"The infant formula market in China continues to be important to us and we are seeing new opportunities beginning to emerge as the regulatory changes taking place in that market begin to bed down. Working in China requires good relationships and a strong technical understanding, and therefore we have appointed Dr Tony McKenna as regional sales manager - China nutritionals reporting to Mike Lee.

"Tony has over 12 years' experience in the China market, four years of which have been while working at Synlait Milk, and this appointment will allow us to put even greater focus on developing our infant formula and nutritional business," says Dr Penno.

Synlait is in the final stages of completing construction of a $27 million dry blending and consumer packaging facility, and expects to be granted registration to export finished infant formula into China following the approval of its Risk Management Plan by the Ministry for Primary Industries.