Beyond Meat announced on June 4 their appointment of former Amazon executive Phil Hardin as their new chief financial officer. He replaced Mark Nelson, who retired in early May but will still stay as a consultant until May 5, 2023.
Amazon Stint
For 15 years, Hardin handled Amazon’s finance and investor relations across numerous business units. His recent assignment was that of vice president of finance for Amazon Advertising, among other leadership roles. This included the following:
- The Director of finance for EU customer fulfillment
- Director of investor relations for Amazon.com
- Director of finance for Kindle content and digital subsidiaries
Hardin will join the plant-based meat maker in July.
An Opportune Time for Beyond Meat
The appointment was made at an opportune time when the plant-based food industry is seeing a rise. Beyond Meat’s main competitor, Impossible Foods, is one among many companies planning to list in the stock market.
On the other hand, Oat milk maker Oatly Group AB went public last May. The company has raised more than a billion dollars in funding, thanks to a boost in investor interest in the plant-based food landscape.
As for Beyond Meat, its stocks saw a rise of about 90% between its IPO in May of 2019 and the end of 2020. As of today, it is up by 14.5%.
Other Appointments
Aside from its new CFO, Beyond Meat also announced the appointments of two new officers. The company named Deanna Jurgens as its new chief growth officer, while Margaret Trask was appointed as its new chief people officer.
Ethan Brown, president and CEO of Beyond Meat has this to say about the recent appointments:
“In each case, we conducted extensive searches to identify best-in-class talent, and I could not be more pleased with the outcome.”
According to web magazine CFO, Brown added that Hardin’s long tenure of strategic investing for Amazon‘s outsized future growth along with the two new appointees’ stellar qualifications ensured that they’d placed the right people.
Brown was quoted as saying, “today, we’ve put in place key members of the team to help drive the business toward our goal of being tomorrow’s global protein company.”
Controversy
Hardin replaces CFO Mark Nelson, who played a significant role in the company’s blockbuster public listing. He came into a controversy when he was named in a fraud claims lawsuit. Former Beyond Meat supplier Don Lee Farms filed the lawsuit.
The legal dispute was due to the premature termination of an exclusive agreement for five years signed by the two parties in December 2014. Both sides are claiming victory as Beyond Meat filed a countersuit, and a trial is scheduled later this year.
