Cornelius, a leading integrated manufacturer and distributor of raw materials, ingredients and speciality chemicals for the life sciences and performance chemicals sectors, has announced the appointment of Gordon Hay, formerly of Brenntag, as Group Operations Director.

Replacing Brian McGowan, who recently stepped down for personal reasons, Gordon joins the Bishop’s Stortford, UK headquartered company to drive the group wide operations strategy as the company further expands in Poland and Russia, extends its product portfolio and vertically integrates its speciality manufacturing business.

Darren Spiby, Group CEO of Cornelius, comments: “We’re delighted to welcome Gordon on board. Having known him for many years, he has a great reputation for driving supply chain efficiency, EH&S excellence and driving truly innovative customer care strategies. He is joining the business at an exciting time. We have just completed a significant restructure of the business, implemented a new ERP system across the Group, and have a number of new breakthrough product innovations coming to market, all of which truly support our ethos of ‘delivering the difference’.

Gordon Hay added: “Having known the Cornelius team from the excellent leadership they have provided to the Federation of European Chemical Companies (FECC) in recent years, I’m delighted to be joining such a forward-thinking company. The chemical distribution market is facing significant challenges in terms of global economic volatility, digitalisation and attracting new talent to take the industry forward. I look forward to working on many of these topics and more at Cornelius and know I’m joining a skilled and talented team that has an exciting future ahead.