Brambles reshuffles roles

The departure of Mr van der Laan, most recently the boss of CHEP Asia-Pacific, after eight years at Brambles, takes the number of senior executives to leave the company to eight.

He was closely associated with the restructuring of the pallet-hire company, the collapse of its dual-listed structure and talks with Toll Holdings and Asciano in 2007.

But Kevin Shuba, whose future at Brambles was under a cloud, will stay on after he was shuffled from his role as boss of CHEP Americas into a newly created role of customer development across the company's worldwide operations.

Jim Ritchie, who joined Brambles in June as the president of CHEP USA, will replace Mr Shuba as the group president of CHEP Americas next week. Brambles' CHEP pallet business in the Americas has consistently been its poor performer, dragging down the results of the company's key business worldwide.

Mr van der Laan's role as boss of CHEP Asia-Pacific will be taken by Peter Mackie, who has been filling in as Mr Gorman's temporary replacement as boss of CHEP Europe since November.

Brambles is expected to announce a replacement for the head of CHEP Europe soon.

Mr Gorman said that the appointment of a chief for Europe, together with the changes announced yesterday, would complete the reorganisation of his senior management team.

In October, Brambles forced out its embattled chief executive, Mike Ihlein, after about two years, replacing him with Mr Gorman, who has been charged with the tough task of reviving its underperforming US business.

Brambles is competing in the US with iGPS of Florida, led by a former CHEP senior executive, Bob Moore. Former Brambles and Coles boss John Fletcher is also on the board.

Shares in Brambles closed up 2? at $7.04 yesterday, but are still about 16 per cent down on their 11-month high in September.