PepsiCo has appointed Wern-Yuen Tan as its CEO Asia Pacific, Australia, New Zealand and China. Tan was previously CEO and president of Walmart China. He will start in the role on 15 June.
Based in Singapore, Tan will report to CEO Ramon Laguarta. He is replacing Ram Krishnan, who will move into the global chief commercial officer (CCO) role.
At Walmart China, he led a team of 100,000 associates responsible for over US$10 billion in annual revenue across the Walmart, Sam’s Club and eCommerce businesses. PepsiCo said it was a “time of transformation” and Tan became an industry pioneer in omnichannel innovation and retail digitisation. Prior to joining Walmart in 2017, Tan was MD for McDonald’s Taiwan.
Laguarta said the company was delighted to welcome him onboard during such a “time of unprecedented change and opportunity”.
“Wern-Yuen has driven transformative innovation and results at every step of his career and brings deep experience with consumers in this diverse region through positions in retail, food service and consulting. His leadership will be instrumental as we look to accelerate growth by leveraging our scale and creating more localised solutions in these important markets,” Laguarta said.
Tan said his focus was to drive growth and localised solutions in the region. “PepsiCo is a truly global company whose products are recognised across the world. With deep roots across this region and an unparalleled offering, PepsiCo is uniquely positioned to expand its market share and existing omnichannel capabilities across APAC,” he said.
PepsiCo said that as CCO, Krishnan will support PepsiCo’s efforts to accelerate growth, with a focus on scaling innovation, commercial and transformation capabilities. “This includes building a data driven demand ecosystem; portfolio transformation; innovating with speed and impact; and building foundational eCommerce, Revenue Management, and Go-to-Market capabilities,” it said.
Laguarta said: “I also want to recognise and express my deep gratitude to Ram and the APAC leadership team for their phenomenal work managing our business through a historically difficult period while delivering strong results and making PepsiCo Faster, Stronger and Better.
“Ram will now return fulltime to his role as global chief commercial officer, a crucial position for PepsiCo’s Winning with Purpose strategy. His continued leadership will be a tremendous asset as we execute on our global consumer and customer sales agenda, whilst developing and scaling new capabilities and business models based on data and technology to deliver future growth.”
