Just Eat chief David Buttress steps down for family reasons
Takeaway deliveries firm Just Eat today shocked the City as its boss David Buttress stepped down due to “urgent family matters”.
Buttress is set to leave at the end of March and will be replaced by chairman John Hughes until a successor is found.
He will stay on as a non-executive director for at least a year. The former Coca-Cola sales executive, who joined Just Eat in 2005 to establish its UK operations, became its chief executive in 2013.
Shares were down 6% at 516.75p.
His tenure has seen a London float, international expansion, a major technology overhaul and even a trial of self-driving delivery robots.
More recently he struck a £200 million deal to buy the company’s largest UK rival, hungryhouse. Today Buttress described the role as a “one of the best jobs in the world”.
Jefferies analyst David Reynolds said Buttress had been one of Britain’s standout entrepreneurs of the past decade.
“A rare CEO, one who has genuinely grown faster [and] more fully than the Just Eat business he has led so capably, he is a profound loss to the business.”
