DURBAN - The founder and former chief executive of EOH Holdings, Asher Bohbot, will step down from the board at the end of the month. EOH, the JSE-listed information technology group, said yesterday that the move was to comply with King IV corporate governance.
“In accordance with King IV, a former chief executive should not serve as chairman of the board until a three-year cooling-off period has been observed,” the group said.
Currently Bohbot is serving as group chairman, and he was the chief executive for 19 years.
EOH said Bohbot would, on an advisory basis, assist the group until the end of July in the implementation of the strategy shared with the market recently.
The changes come two weeks after multinational technology giant Microsoft announced that it was planning to terminate its contract with EOH Mthombo, a subsidiary of EOH.
EOH Holdings' share price fell nearly 30 percent with the expected termination of the EOH Mthombo contract.
The group said profits could take a R10 million hit as a result of the termination of two contracts by Microsoft.
The company's shares declined by a further 10 percent on Monday after the group announced that talks between its chief executive Stephen van Coller and Microsoft had failed to yield positive results regarding the decision to terminate its Channel Partner Agreement with EOH Mthombo.
Yesterday, with the latest board announcement, the share price closed 12.73 percent higher on the JSE at R16.47.
Bohbot said he had confidence in EOH’s management and believed that the new strategy, which was in advanced stages of implementation, would be beneficial to all stakeholders.
The other expected changes to the EOH board would see Rob Sporen, founding member of EOH and non-executive director, resigning from the board at the end of the month after 20 years of service to the group.
“The directors thank Rob Sporen for his great service, vision and contribution to EOH over these years. He has been instrumental in building EOH and the board wishes him all the best in his retirement,” the group said.
Another long-serving board member, Professor Tshilidzi Marwala, a non-executive director, would also resign after serving the group for 11 years, to also align with King IV’s stipulation on board member independence.
The group also said Tebogo Maenetja, a human resources executive director, would leave EOH at the end of April. EOH said a process to appoint new board members was under way and shareholders would be advised of such appointments in due course.
On the departure of Maenetja, Van Coller said he had noted with concern that some media had implicated Maenetja in the restructuring of the board in order to improve governance compliance within EOH.
“Having fulfilled this request to split the business into three business units, Tebogo Maenetja has decided to resign to pursue an exciting HR position at a large multinational. I wish her all the best,” Van Coller said.