Maersk appoints Carlsberg's Nils Andersen as new chief

COPENHAGEN: AP Moeller-Maersk, the world’s largest shipping company, replaced its chief executive officer with Carlsberg’s Nils Smedegaard Andersen after a 23% drop in profit last year and said two other top executives quit.

The 48-year-old CEO of the Nordic region’s biggest brewer succeeds Jess Soederberg, 62, who said he asked to retire two years early after leading Copenhagen-based Maersk since 1993. The co-leader of Maersk Line, the company’s biggest unit, and the head of port operations also will leave, Maersk said.

Andersen has run Carlsberg since 2001, and the Danish beermaker’s shares have more than doubled in two years. Maersk shares advanced 12%. Profit at Maersk, controlled by 93-year-old billionaire Maersk Mc-Kinney Moeller, has fallen for two years even as sales rose.

Shipping rates dropped last year as competitors raced to meet growing demand, particularly in China. “Andersen is a surprising choice and not necessarily an ideal one,” said Stephen Rammer, an analyst with Alm. Brand Henton in Copenhagen. “His experience is in retail, and that’s different from transport and business-to-business, which is what Maersk does.”

Maersk shares dropped 1,100 kroner, or 1.6%, to 65,900 kroner in Copenhagen. Carlsberg shares fell 0.9% to 655 kroner. “The container shipping business must make more money,” Andersen said in an interview with Danish television channel TV2. “We will be working on that.”

Andersen will move to Maersk by December 1, Valby, Denmark-based Carlsberg said in a statement. He will lead a company with a market value of 288 billion kroner ($51.9 billion), more than five times the size of Carlsberg.