New BHP chair's packed career

Former Amcor-boss, Ken Mackenzie has been named BHP Billiton Chairman-elect.

Ken Mackenzie

Former Amcor-boss, Ken Mackenzie has been named BHP Billiton Chairman-elect. (AAP)

BHP Billiton's chairman-elect Ken MacKenzie will take over from Jac Nasser in September after a successful career with packaging giant Amcor.

* Born in Montreal, Canada, 53-year-old Mr MacKenzie is a Canadian national and fluent German and French speaker.

* A trained engineer, he began his career as a manufacturing strategy consultant with consulting firm Accenture.

* Mr MacKenzie had a 23-year career with Amcor, working across all major operating divisions before becoming CEO in 2005. He is credited with creating one of Australia's few blue-chip companies to successfully expand offshore.

* He retired from Amcor in April, 2015 after 10 years as CEO, after rationalising Amcor's portfolio and increasing the company's market capitalisation from $US4.5 billion to $US12.5 billion.

* Mr MacKenzie's appointment comes as BHP struggles to emerge from a period of turmoil: the 2015 dam collapse at its Samarco joint venture iron ore project in Brazil that killed 19 people; criticism of the company's costly investments in US shale oil projects; and pressure from New York-based activist investor, Elliott, which accuses the Australian and London listed miner of underperforming rival Rio Tinto by 11 per cent over the past decade.


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Source: AAP



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