OCI NV, Amsterdam, announced on April 17 that its non-executive board of directors will propose to appoint Dod Fraser and David Welch as independent non-executive members and Maud de Vries as executive member of the board of directors at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of shareholders on May 29. This will increase the OCI board from nine to 12 members.
The new board will consist of independent non-executive Chairman Michael Bennett; Executive Directors Nassef Sawiris, Hassan Badrawi, and Maud de Vries; non-executive Director Jérôme Guiraud; and independent non-executive Directors Dod Fraser, Gregory Heckman, Robert Jan van de Kraats, Anja Montijn, Sipko Schat, David Welch, and Jan Ter Wisch.
Welch, a U.S. citizen, recently retired as President for International and Government Affairs at Bechtel. Prior to that, Welch served 32 years with the U.S. Foreign Service. He was nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate to senior positions in successive Democrat and Republican administrations: among other roles, he was Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs (2005-2008), the senior-most U.S. diplomat for the region, and served as Ambassador to Egypt (2001-2005), Assistant Secretary for International Organizations (1998-2001), and acting Chief of Mission in Saudi Arabia (1992-1994). Welch also served on the National Security Council staff at the White House (1989-1991). In 2008, he attained the lifetime rank of Career Ambassador, one of only about 60 American diplomats to achieve this designation in its history.
Welch was a board member of the U.S.-Saudi, the U.S.-U.A.E., and the U.S.-Egypt Business Councils, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the American Academy of Diplomacy. He is a graduate of Georgetown University and the Fletcher School at Tufts University.
Fraser, a U.S. citizen, is currently president of consulting firm Sackett Partners, and was until its delisting in 2018 a member of the board of OCI Partners LLC, now a 100 percent subsidiary of OCI NV. During his 27-year career in investment banking, he served as Managing Director and Group Executive of the Global Oil and Gas Group of Chase Manhattan Bank (now JP Morgan Chase & Co.) from 1995 until 2000, and held various positions of increasing responsibility with Lazard Freres & Co., most recently as General Partner, from 1978 to 1995. Fraser is a director of two public companies: Subsea 7 SA since 2009, and Rayonier Inc. since 2014. He previously also served on the boards of Smith International Inc., Terra Industries Inc., and Forest Oil Corp. He holds a degree from Princeton University.
De Vries, a Dutch citizen, serves as the group’s General Counsel and Executive Vice President, Legal and Human Resources. She joined OCI in 2014 and has held several leadership positions, including General Counsel, HR Director, Company Secretary, and Compliance Officer. Prior to joining OCI, she held the positions of General Counsel/Senior Executive at Corio NV.
De Vries started her career as an attorney at Dutch law firm Trenité Van Doorne. She has a law degree from the University of Leiden in the Netherlands and was admitted to the bar in 1997. She also attended INSEAD, where she completed the Strategy Execution Programme.