Nestlé Can Head Off a Fight With Dan Loeb
ByNestlé can pre-empt the activist Dan Loeb’s next move. Directors at the $265 billion Kit Kat maker are light on consumer and digital expertise. Half the 14-member board is from Switzerland, the company’s home market but one that’s worth just 2 percent of sales. Nestlé’s latest plans to revamp are far from radical, and Mr. Loeb, the founder of Third Point, may next seek boardroom changes. Nestlé could head off a fight by beating him to it.
To be fair, Mark Schneider, the relatively new chief executive, is Nestlé’s first externally hired boss in nearly 100 years. And the company has added former Xerox and Credit Suisse executives to its board in recent years. Thanks to these additions, the tenure of the average independent director has fallen to about six years, less entrenched than is implied by the nine-year average at the consumer giant Procter & Gamble, where the activist investor Nelson Peltz is trying to get a seat. But there is room for improvement…
Nestlé Can Head Off a Fight With Dan Loeb
