Jan Rupert has stepped down as group manufacturing director from Richemont but will stay within the group as executive director.
Rupert will step down on April 1 and Richemont has described the reason behind the move as to allow him to “devote time to other activities”. He will be up for re-election at the luxury group’s annual general meeting in September.
Taking over from Rupert as group manufacturing director will be Richemont deputy chief executive Richard Lepeu.
Separately Richemont has announced the termination of its share buy-back programme. The group initially announced a two-year plan to buy back 10 million of its own A bearer shares over a two-year period in May 2010 and a year later it extended the programme to buy an additional 5 million A bearer shares. However, the group has now halted this at 12.69 million shares.
Richemont said in a statement: “The shares acquired are held in treasury to cover the obligations arising from the stock option plan, which benefits certain executives of the Richemont Group. The repurchased shares will not be cancelled.”
