Bunge Ltd., White Plains, N.Y., has named Christos Dimopoulos as president, Agribusiness. This follows the previous announcement of Brian Thomsen’s retirement, and is effective immediately.
Dimopoulos joined Bunge in 2004 and most recently served as senior vice president, global grains and oilseeds. Prior to joining Bunge, he held roles of increasing responsibility in Europe and the U.S. with Tradigrain and Intrade Risk Management. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from HEC Lausanne in Business Management & Marketing.
Bunge has also added three new members to its board of directors – Paul J. Fribourg, chairman and CEO of Continental Grain Co.; Henry W. (Jay) Winship, president of Pacific Point Capital LLC; and Gregory Heckman, founding partner of Flatwater Partners. Heckman has over 30 years of experience in the agriculture, energy, and food processing industries and most recently was CEO of The Gavilon Group. With the addition of the three new directors, the board has expanded to 14 directors.
The board has determined that Heckman and Winship are independent directors for purposes of the NYSE corporate governance listing rules, as well as Bunge’s standards of director independence.
Bunge, the D. E. Shaw group, and Continental Grain reached an agreement to appoint the three directors, as well as a fourth, mutually agreeable independent director, to be appointed by year end.
In addition, Bunge formed a strategic review committee of the board, which will be chaired by Fribourg and will include new directors Heckman and Winship, as well as three current directors – Andrew Ferrier, Kathleen Hyle, and Mark Zenuk. The committee will conduct a comprehensive, strategic review focused on enhancing long-term shareholder value. It will make recommendations to the CEO and the board. Bunge expects to provide future updates as appropriate.
In addition to these new appointments, the company added Mark Zenuk and Vinita Bali to the board over the past ten months. Zenuk has served as managing partner of Tillridge Global Agribusiness Partners, an agribusiness private equity firm, since 2016. Bali brings global food industry experience, having served as CEO of Britannia Industries, a publicly listed food company in India.