Management magazine Executive of the Year 2007

Deloitte/ Management magazine Executive of the Year 2007

Lloyd Morrison of Infratil success is New Zealand’s top business executive for 2007.

He was last night named the Deloitte/Management magazine Executive of the Year at the annual Top 200 Awards, now in their 18th year and regarded by business leaders as the country’s most prestigious business awards. Morrison took the title ahead of fierce competition from New Zealand Post's John Allen and Foodstuffs Auckland's Tony Carter.

Judges said Morrison is an astute man and strategically brilliant. They praised his ability to question, probe and challenge, saying he's a clever operator and absolutely loyal.

“Under his visionary leadership and early recognition of the potential of infrastructure and utilities, Infratil has produced consistently excellent results. They make strategic investments that are linked to important infrastructure both in New Zealand and offshore.”

Company of the Year Award
Alongside Lloyd Morrison's personal success, the company he leads took top honours as this year’s Deloitte/Management magazine Company of the Year. Judges commented that few New Zealand companies exemplify the “Stepping Beyond” theme of this year's Deloitte/Management magazine Top 200 Awards better than Infratil.

“It consistently meets its commitment to provide shareholders with an annual return of 20 percent,” they said. “The company is becoming one of the world's most enlightened, best managed, focused and risk-wise investors in growth infrastructure. It is thoughtfully led, articulates its strategy and corporate objectives and has performed consistently over time.”

Designworks Enterprise IG Visionary Leader Award
Winner: Eion Edgar

Business, education, arts and sport. To succeed at leadership level in any one of these is commendable. To stay at the top and give back to all four is outstanding. It is the combination of vision, drive and duty that has enabled him to do this, that has seen Eion Edgar named as New Zealand's Visionary Leader for 2007.

With comments ranging from praise of his business acumen and there was nobody else in the running, the judges were unanimous it was high-time this proudly Southern man was honoured.

Other awards presented on the night were:

QBE Insurance Chairperson of the Year
Winner: John Palmer, chair Air New Zealand and Solid Energy.

Kensington Swan Ethical Governance Award
Winner: NZ Aluminium Smelters

Marsh Most Improved Performance Award
Winner: Kiwibank

Colliers International Best Growth Strategy
Winner: Mainfreight

Deloitte Emerging Enterprise Award
Winner: Endace

NZIM/Eagle Technology Young Executive of the Year
Winner: Mason Pratt, managing director, Provoke Solutions

Management magazine Top 200 list for 2007

The awards were made in conjunction with the release of the Deloitte/Management magazine Top 200 list for 2007 which shows the country's largest companies (judged by revenue).

As usual, Fonterra tops the lists but this year Fletcher Building rose one place to topple Telecom from the number two ranking.

Strong international commodity prices and a defiantly buoyant domestic economy – despite repeated interest rate hikes and continued talk of a slowdown – joined forces to lift the combined revenue of the companies by a solid 7.34 percent this year. In total, the businesses collected $134.9 billion, an increase from last year's group which had a combined revenue of $125.7 billion.

Collective profitability for the top 200 of 2007, when compared with the top 200 group of 2006,was up an impressive 47 percent to $9.3 billion. In 2006 the combined profits came to $6.3 billion. The threshold for making the list also rose – sitting at $120 million this year from $118 million in 2006.

Ends

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