Russia's O'Key Group has announced the appointment of Armin Burger as its new chief executive.
Burger, 55, is currently the chief executive of the group's Da! discount chain, and will retain his role at the banner as well as taking the CEO role for the overall group.
Discounter Role
He has been with the O'Key Group for the past five years, during which time has helped developed the group's discounter business, as well as its new compact hypermarket format.
Prior to joining O'Key, he spent 20 years working with Aldi Sued, and was a members of the supervisory board at the discounter, overseeing ten countries and 4,500 stores. Prior to that, he was CEO fo Hofer KG in Austria.
In a statement, O'Key Group said that Burger 'has very deep knowledge of the Russian retail industry. In his new role, Mr. Burger will focus on increasing the pace of the hypermarket business transformation and on the continuing development of both retail formats.'
Hypermarket Development
Burger replaces Miodrag Borojevic as the CEO of the group, however O'Key confirmed that he will stay on to assist with the development of the group's hypermarket format.
In the statement, O'Key Group also confirmed that it expected net retail revenue generated by its hypermarkets business to 'decrease by low single digits in 2018', however it anticipates 2018 profitability to increase in line with that of the first half of the year.
Earlier this month, O'Key reported a 8.5% decrease in revenue in the first half of its financial year, saying that this was triggered by the sale of its supermarket business.
© 2018 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Stephen Wynne-Jones. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
