PepsiCo's board of directors in January elected Ramon Laguarta, CEO and a member of the board, to serve as chairman of the board effective Feb. 1. That will relieve Indra Nooyi of her final role with the company.
Last August, PepsiCo revealed Nooyi's plans to retire from the company she's worked at for 24 years,12 as CEO. At that time, Laguarta was named to replace her as CEO, a title he formally got Oct. 3, while Nooyi would continue as chairman into early 2019.
Laguarta has 22 years at the company. He will become just the sixth CEO and/or chairman in PepsiCo's 53-year history. Prior to Nooyi, chairman/CEOs were Steven Reinemund, Roger Enrico and Wayne Calloway. After the merger that created PepsiCo from Frito-Lay Co. and Pepsi Cola Co., Herman Lay was the first chairman while Donald Kendall was CEO.
All have been appointed from within the organization, "a testament to PepsiCo's strong bench of talent and succession planning," the company said back in August.
