Coca-Cola Company appoints new Africa, Middle East leaders to tap opportunities

2nd July 2020 By: Schalk Burger - Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

Beverage multinational The Coca-Cola Company on July 2 announced the appointment of Matrona Filippou as its business unit president for the Southern and East Africa region, while former Southern and East Africa region president Bruno Pietracci has taken up the position as Africa & Middle East president with effect from May 1.

"Despite the challenges that Covid-19 presents for businesses at this time, I’m optimistic that from this crisis new opportunities across the Southern & East Africa region will arise. The Coca-Cola Company remains focused on ensuring our products are delivered safely to the stores and communities, while taking every precaution to curb the further spread of the virus,” said Filippou.

“While this is an extremely challenging time from a global economic perspective, Africa and the Middle East present exciting opportunities for The Coca-Cola Company to scale our capabilities and make our business stronger than before. These key regions remain an important driver of The Coca-Cola Company’s overarching growth strategy over the next decade, Pietracci concurred.

"I look forward to helping build on The Coca-Cola Company’s strong record of continuous innovation to leverage opportunities and create shared opportunities to enhance the prosperity of communities across our key markets the Middle East and across Africa.”

Filippou has held a variety of positions throughout more than 24 years at The Coca Cola Company, starting out in the South African office and then gaining experience on the continent, including key markets such as Nigeria and Kenya. She was performance and strategy director and stills GM for the Central, East and West Africa Business Unit and GM in charge of stills, ventures and emerging brands for the Coca-Cola West Africa business unit.

In 2016, Filippou led the successful execution of the largest juice and dairy merger and acquisition for The Coca-Cola Company on the African continent.

Filippou moved to Athens in 2018 where she has held the position of South-East Europe franchise operations director covering countries such as Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Greece and Romania for the past two years.

Pietracci joined Coca-Cola in Brazil in 2008 as strategic planning and research VP. In 2010, he moved into operations to lead the Southern Brazil region. He was then appointed to lead the Central Franchise Unit, partnering with bottler Coca-Cola FEMSA to reshape business in that region and later named GM of the Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador markets.

He went on to serve as VP Operations for the company’s Europe, Middle East and Africa Group markets before heading to South Africa to take up the position of President of the Southern and East Africa business unit of The Coca-Cola Company in 2018.

Over more than a decade, he has continued to build on his deep knowledge and experience of building the capabilities of the world’s biggest beverage company to build enduring strength through disciplined growth.

Both are looking forward to working together to reinforce The Coca-Cola Company’s commitment to creating shared opportunities to enhance the prosperity of communities across African as the Company continues to play a significant role in Africa’s sustainable and inclusive growth during Covid-19 and beyond, the statement concluded.