Chief Operating Officer
Damas LLC
Total years of experience :22 years, 4 Months
Mannai Corporation acquired Damas LLC (1 billion USD manufacturer and retailer of luxury jewelry) and required a turnaround from loss making to profit making.
Reporting to the CEO, member of the executive committee, managing a team of 300+ people including the Gold Product Division, the Diamond Product Division, Factory, Logistics, Planning and Procurement.
Facilitated the successful turnaround in the following key areas:
• Product: Selection of new brands and products. Rolled out new product lines. Created homogenous families of products instead of ‘Generic’ products. Increased core product line sales by 50%.
• Inventory: Created a merchandising plan for each of the 220+ stores. Increased stock rotations and revenue by a factor of two in key areas.
• Planning and Procurement: Supply base rationalization, focusing on high quality, low cost suppliers. Established KPIs and Metrics. Completed the rollout of key ERP inventory management modules, giving greater visibility and control of the business (supply and demand management.)
• Quality: Implement the Damas Quality System, immediately reducing product risk.
• Governance: Reduced the number of open audit findings by 50% in 12 months, reduce process risks.
• Interim management. In the absence of a retail director, managed day to day store operations. In the absence of a marketing director, ran marketing operations for 18 months. Rolled out monthly and seasonal marketing plans. Ensured consistency between marketing, product and sales. Grow year on year sales of key product lines by 25%.
Damas went from loss making in 2012 to operating profit in 2013.
Chief Operating Officer, Damas LLC, Dubai
01/2013 - present
Mannai Corporation acquired Damas LLC (1 billion USD manufacturer and retailer of luxury jewelry) and required a turnaround from loss making to profit making.
Reporting to the CEO, member of the executive committee, managing a team of 300+ people including the Gold Product Division, the Diamond Product Division, Factory, Logistics, Planning and Procurement.
Facilitated the successful turnaround in the following key areas: • Product: Selection of new brands and products. Rolled out new product lines. Created homogenous families of products instead of 'Generic' products. Increased core product line sales by 50%.
• Inventory: Created a merchandising plan for each of the 220+ stores. Increased stock rotations and revenue by a factor of two in key areas.
• Planning and Procurement: Supply base rationalization, focusing on high quality, low cost suppliers. Established KPIs and Metrics. Completed the rollout of key ERP inventory management modules, giving greater visibility and control of the business (supply and demand management.)
• Quality: Implement the Damas Quality System, immediately reducing product risk.
• Governance: Reduced the number of open audit findings by 50% in 12 months, reduce process risks.
• Interim management. In the absence of a retail director, managed day to day store operations. In the absence of a marketing director, ran marketing operations for 18 months. Rolled out monthly and seasonal marketing plans. Ensured consistency between marketing, product and sales. Grow year on year sales of key product lines by 25%.
Damas went from loss making in 2012 to 250M AED operating profit in 2013.
Head of Materials, PWS, Applied Materials, Lausanne, Switzerland
2011-2012
Applied Materials acquired HCT (1 billion Swiss franc manufacturer of industrial solar equipment) and required support during a period of rapid growth then rapid contraction.
Reporting to the Operations Director, managed a team of 200 people in Planning, Purchasing, Logistics, export and distribution.
Delivered an SAP implementation, allowing the factory to be relocated to China in late 2012.
Head of Logistics, Calvin Klein watches and jewelry, Swatch Group, Bienne Switzerland
2008-2009
Calvin Klein watches and jewelry is a joint venture between PVH (USA) and Swatch group (Switzerland.) Reporting to the President, member of the executive committee, I was responsible for a team of 150 people covering Planning, Purchasing, Production, Logistics and Worldwide after sales service.
Key successes included rolling out a new SAP forecasting module, and in-sourcing European watch repair.
Production Director, Goldmund, Geneva, Switzerland
2007-2008
A family owned high-end audio company retailing systems at 100 000 USD to 1 million USD. I was responsible for Product design finalization (based on the output from R+D, ) Planning, Purchasing, Production, Logistics, wordwide after sales service.
Key successes including rolling out the monthly new product schedule, outsourcing printed circuit board assembly, and implementing turnkey manufacturing of complex audio systems to cut costs.
Head of Logistics, TAG Heuer, LVMH, Neuchatel, Switzerland
2001-2007
Post merger integration following LVMH acquisition of TAG Heuer.
Reporting to the VP Operations, manage Planning, Outsource Manufacturing, Logistics and worldwide distribution.
Projects included improvement of operational efficiency in worldwide subsidiaries, create a European distribution centre, create an Asian logistics hub in Hong Kong, and prepare a complete SAP gap analysis for operations. Cut costs and improve operational efficiency worldwide.
Complete job titles previous experience
MBA (The Open University Business School, 1997)
Double Masters Degree in Engineering (Strathclyde, 1986)