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Swiss luxury group Richemont has named new chief executives for its jewellery brands Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels as it grapples with succession planning and an industry-wide downturn.
Louis Ferla, current head of Richemont-owned luxury watchmaker Vacheron Constantin, will succeed Cyrille Vigneron, who has led Cartier for eight years.
Cartier’s jewelry and watch sales are the biggest contributors to Richemont’s revenue and profit, and the new appointments, which will take effect in September, are the latest in a series of management changes at the group.
Richemont chairman Johann Rupert overhauled the group’s leadership in May to streamline decision-making.
Industry insiders said the reorganization was also a way for 74-year-old Rupert, who founded the group in 1988 and is now its controlling shareholder, to give investors a taste of generational change.
While Rupert has no plans to retire, there is no clear successor among his three children. Like other companies in the luxury industry, such as LVMH, Richemont is grappling with who will take over the leadership of the group after its founder retires.
Nicolas Bos, formerly CEO of Richemont Group’s second largest jewelry brand Van Cleef & Arpels, is appointed CEO holds an expanded version of that role and will take a seat on the board in September.
Richemont announced on Tuesday (July 2) that Catherine Rénier, currently CEO of Jaeger-LeCoultre and who has held various positions at Richemont since 1999, will succeed Bos as CEO of Van Cleef & Arpels in September.
Richemont also owns fashion brands including watchmaker Piaget and Chloé. It also holds a majority stake in Yoox Net-a-Porter, which it had been seeking to sell, but a deal to online rival Farfetch fell through at the end of 2023.
Rupert said on Tuesday: “I am delighted that Louis has accepted the top job at Cartier.
“He has positioned Vacheron Constantin so brilliantly that he has earned the admiration and respect of his colleagues across the Group and the industry at large.”
The company said Vigneron will assist with the transition during the summer and retire in early September. After leaving his post, he will become chairman of Cartier’s cultural and philanthropic divisions.
Ferra has been CEO of Vacheron Constantin since 2017, having previously held a number of senior positions at Cartier, including overseeing its operations in China, the Middle East and India. He has worked in Asia for nearly two decades, starting his career in 2001 at Alfred Dunhill in Hong Kong.
The Asia-Pacific region is important to the group, which said in January that sales in the region would grow “substantially” in 2023, even as a cooling Chinese economy has recently sparked concerns in the luxury goods industry.
Last month it was revealed Bernard Arnault, the billionaire founder of LVMH, has bought a stake in Richemont as a personal investment.
Silvia Sciorilli Borrelli in Milan and Maxine Kelly in London © 2024 Financial Times
This story originally appeared in Financial Times
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