Abbott Labs Appoints CFO on the Heels of New CEO Hire
09 January 2020 - 9:03AM
Dow Jones News
By Mark Maurer and Dave Sebastian
Abbott Laboratories appointed a new finance chief who is
expected to help guide the company through its U.S. launch of a new
version of a glucose monitor for diabetes.
The Abbott Park, Ill.-based maker of health-care products
Wednesday said Robert Funck Jr., the company's senior vice
president of finance and controller, will become CFO on March 1.
Finance Chief Brian Yoor, who has held the CFO role since 2015,
will retire on Feb. 29, the company said
The promotion of Mr. Funck, who joined Abbott in 1987 and has
served in various executive finance roles since 2005, comes on the
heels of the company's appointment of Robert Ford as chief
executive.
Mr. Ford, the company's president and operating chief, will
succeed Miles White as CEO in March, Abbott said in November. Mr.
White, who has been CEO since 1999, will remain executive chairman.
Abbott's annual sales grew to $30.6 billion from about $12.5
billion under Mr. White.
Abbott in recent years has made large acquisitions, such as the
$23.6 billion purchase of St. Jude Medical, and received Food and
Drug Administration approval for new products, such as the
MitraClip G4 heart-valve repair device. The company, which is
awaiting approval of the glucose monitor FreeStyle Libre 2,
reported $8.08 billion in revenue in the third quarter, up 5.5%
from the same quarter a year earlier.
With much of the change behind Abbott, the pipeline is somewhat
opaque to investors and analysts, said Raj Denhoy, an analyst at
Jefferies LLC. Although the company demonstrates strong growth
potential, the new CFO will likely need to focus on capital
deployment at some point, he said.
"Their ability to sustain themselves is probably the biggest
challenge, though not an imminent one," Mr. Denhoy said.
Historically low interest rates will likely prompt analysts to
question Mr. Funck on how he plans to help the company manage its
balance-sheet flexibility, said Vijay Kumar, an analyst at Evercore
ISI.
Write to Mark Maurer at mark.maurer@wsj.com and Dave Sebastian
at dave.sebastian@wsj.com.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 08, 2020 16:48 ET (21:48 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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