Unilever to unify Dutch and UK sides

CONSUMER goods group Unilever is to go through a radical shake-up, reforming the dual Anglo-Dutch structure and creating a single company, The Independent on Sunday reported.The overhaul will be announced on 10 February alongside its full-year figures, and will be flagged as putting Unilever in a better position to compete with the new Procter & Gamble/Gillette titan, the paper added.Unilever's joint chairmen, Patrick Cescau, and Antony Burgmans, will change roles, with Burgmans becoming executive chairman in charge of strategy and Cescau chief executive running the day-to-day operations.Unilever will confirm it is to operate with a single board, something that has in effect been the case since it announced that the non-executive directors of the UK board would be the same as the appointed directors on the Dutch board.The group will also announce plans to unify its two headquarters in Rotterdam and London and set up one HQ - though there is disagreement about where this should be based.The Independent said that there are also suggestions that Unilever could merge its legal entities and share structures, though this is complex and will be considered only when the operational changes are completed.