Mining Rental Specialist Emeco’s CEO Steps Down
Australian heavy equipment rental company Emeco, which also operates in Canada, Chile and Indonesia said its CEO Ken Lewsey will step down and be replaced by chief operating officer Ian Testrow. Testrow will also become managing director, and his role will encompass both CEO and COO activities.
Also Emeco’s chief financial officer, Greg Hawkins, has been invited to join the Emeco board and become executive director, finance.
Testrow will focus his efforts on all customer-facing parts of the Emeco business, the company said, while Hawkins will concentrate on financial matters.
“The board asked Ken to refocus Emeco on its customers, review its strategy and, given the current circumstance in the mining services industry, significantly reduce costs,” said Emeco board chairman Alec Brennan. “He has made major contributions in all of these areas. In his work leading the Project Fit cost reduction initiative, it became clear to Ken that further management downsizing was required and, accordingly, he has decided that it is now time for him to step down.”
Lewsey agreed to be available to help the board in transition arrangements during the next few months.
The company posted a 21 percent revenue increase in the most recent quarter through the end of June, with revenue reaching A$65.3 million (about U.S. $47.9 million). Utilization rose to 74 percent compared to 50 percent in the year-ago quarter.
Also, in June Emeco ended merger talks with competitor Orionstone and abandoned plans to buy truck rental outfit Rentco.
About the Author
Michael Roth
Editor
Michael Roth has covered the equipment rental industry full time for RER since 1989 and has served as the magazine’s editor in chief since 1994. He has nearly 30 years experience as a professional journalist. Roth has visited hundreds of rental centers and industry manufacturers, written hundreds of feature stories for RER and thousands of news stories for the magazine and its electronic newsletter RER Reports. Roth has interviewed leading executives for most of the industry’s largest rental companies and manufacturers as well as hundreds of smaller independent companies. He has visited with and reported on rental companies and manufacturers in Europe, Central America and Asia as well as Mexico, Canada and the United States. Roth was co-founder of RER Reports, the industry’s first weekly newsletter, which began as a fax newsletter in 1996, and later became an online newsletter. Roth has spoken at conventions sponsored by the American Rental Association, Associated Equipment Distributors, California Rental Association and other industry events and has spoken before industry groups in several countries. He lives and works in Los Angeles when he’s not traveling to cover industry events.