Puma appoints Soerensen as new COO

Lars Soerensen

Just a little more than a year in his position, Andy Koehler will leave his job as Chief Operating Officer (COO) at Puma.

According to a company statement, Koehler wishes “to leave Puma for personal reasons, effective July 31, 2014”. He will remain available to the Kering Group as a consultant.

Following this decision, Lars Radoor Soerensen has been appointed new COO of the Puma SE as of August 1, 2014. Soerensen joined Puma in November 2013 and has led the areas of Business Processes and Intelligence as well as Information Technology since. Previously, the Dane has been employed as COO at the Bestseller Group and Esprit and before that held leading roles at Adidas and Lego.

In announcing Puma’s better-than-expected financial results for the second quarter of 2014, chief executive Bjorn Gulden said that Puma was not on the verge of acquiring a stake in Dortmund. It emerged yesterday (Monday) that the club is interested in selling 10 per cent of the club to two strategic investors over the next two months, and Puma has been linked with a possible investment due to its existing commercial partnership with Dortmund.

Puma said today (Tuesday) that earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) fell by 60 per cent to €12.6m ($16.9m), while net profit dropped by 76 per cent to €4.2m. Analysts had anticipated EBIT of about €10.4m and net profit of €3.6m.