New 888 CEO to be tasked with “bigger sense of ambition”, says Lord Mendelsohn
Executive chairman says search for Itai Pazner’s replacement is progressing as he insists operator needs to challenge global giants
888 executive chairman Lord Mendelsohn has said the operator’s next CEO will be tasked with more ambitious goals when leading the business in the future.
Mendelsohn has been effectively acting as CEO following the departure of Itai Pazner in January amid the Middle East VIP compliance issues at the firm, and confirmed the hunt for a replacement is going well.
Speaking following the full-year 2022 results for a group that includes brands 888, William Hill and Mr Green, Mendelsohn said the appointment of a new CEO is a “priority” for the board.
He said: “We have been pleased with the depth and calibre of the candidates that we are engaging with, and we are making good progress with our search and interviews. We intend to make an announcement of the new CEO in the coming months.”
It is understood that Mendelsohn is looking outside of 888 for a new permanent CEO, with the new boss to be supported by a C-suite including chief strategy officer Vaughan Lewis and CFO Yariv Dafna.
As part of the London-listed company’s financial update, 888 detailed plans to reduce its debt following the £1.95bn acquisition of William Hill International.
Group net debt now sits at £1.73bn, with a net debt to EBITDA ratio of 5.6x. Bosses said they expect to bring this ratio down to less than 3.5x by 2025.
When questioned on whether deleveraging the debt was the main priority for the incoming CEO, Mendelsohn was bullish on his hopes for the eventually successful candidate.
“I’m not sure that when the new CEO comes in and I become the non-executive chairman that would be the one big goal – that is inherent in our plan,” he said. “I might think more ambitiously by tasking the new chief executive officer with an even bigger goal than that.
“It is important to say that our focus has to be on deleveraging effectively; we continue to grow the business, we continue to grow EBITDA and we continue to excel in customer experience in the product offering.
“ at the people we are competing with and trying to become an effective global operator, I suspect the target that we will give the new CEO will be a much bigger sense of ambition about where they can drive the business,” he added.
The last 12 months have been a rough ride for 888 investors as the firm’s shares have slumped 65% to around 77p at the time of writing.
In March, 888 crashed out of both London’s FTSE 250 and FTSE 350 indices.