KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 18): Maxis Bhd chief operating officer (COO) Gökhan Ogut has been promoted to chief executive officer (CEO) of the group effective May 1.

He will be reporting to the chairman and the board of directors.

According to Maxis, Ogut, who had assumed the COO role on Sept 1 last year, takes over from Robert Nason, who is currently the interim CEO of Maxis.

Nason will remain on the board as a non-independent non-executive director, and will be appointed as chairman of the business and information technology transformation committee and a member of the audit committee.

"The board has provided for a smooth transition period between Ogut and Nason, which will expire at the conclusion of Nason's contract as the interim CEO of Maxis on April 30," said Maxis chairman Raja Tan Sri Arshad in a statement today.

"We are pleased to welcome Ogut as CEO of Maxis. We are confident that with his vast experience and focus on innovation and growth, he is the right person to drive our new strategy," he added.

Ogut was previously the CEO of Vodafone Turkey. Before Vodafone, he was in senior marketing as well as general management roles with a number of large and well-known companies like Danone and Procter & Gamble, holding positions that had domestic, as well as global responsibilities in Turkey, the US and France.

At 3.59pm, Maxis shares were down 8 sen or 1.42% at RM5.55 today, with 658,600 shares done, bringing a market capitalisation of RM43.38 billion.