Industry Moves: Tesco Telecoms Promotes Batchelor To CEO

Supermarket telco Tesco Telecoms has promoted its marketing director Lance Batchelor to be CEO, encompassing its Tesco Mobile MVNO, internet access, VoIP, mobile sales and more. The supermarket giant reckons it could turn a sub-£400 million ($705 million) annual profit in to £1 billion ($1.7 billion) and recently rebranded itself. The MVNO launched in 2003 and is a 50/50 JV with O2. Batchelor replaces Andy Dewhurst and is a former Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) marketing director and Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) chief marketing officer. Tesco Mobile has 1.5 million subscribers while Wal-Mart-owned rival Asda has about 11 million.