American Vanguard Corp., a Newport Beach provider of products to protect crops, today named Douglas A. “Dak” Kaye III as the new chief executive officer, effective Dec. 9.
Kaye for the past 13 years has served various senior leadership roles at Albaugh LLC, a top ten global crop protection company, including most recently as president of its North America division.
“I have admired American Vanguard for many years,” Kaye said in a statement. “I view it as having strong relationships with customers by providing solutions that customers know and trust. I’m confident we can accelerate the transformation underway, driving revenue growth and margin improvement.”
Shares of American Vanguard were unchanged after the announcement. In regular trading, they fell 3.4% to $5.94 and a $171 million market cap (NYSE: AVD).
The shares dropped 37% on Aug. 9 after it released second-quarter results that it called unacceptable. The company has been looking for a new CEO since Eric Wintemute stepped down from the role in July.