Gerd Peter Poppinga, who recently replaced Tito Martins in Toronto as chief executive officer of Vale Canada and executive director of base metals and marketing and information technology for Vale, is expected to make a trip to Thompson "in the near future," Ryan Land, corporate affairs manager for Vale's Manitoba Operations, said May 23.
"Mr. Poppinga has been to Thompson in his previous roles and since taking on the new role, I would expect a visit in the near future that includes public interaction," Land said.
Martins returned to Brazil when he was promoted to chief financial officer for all of Vale last Nov. 24, after being passed over seven months earlier in April 2011 for the top job as chief executive officer of Vale in favour of his predecessor in Canada, Murilo Ferreira, who rejoined the company and replaced Roger Agnelli as CEO on May 22, 2011.
Ferreira was chief executive officer of Vale Inco, currently known as Vale Canada, in Toronto and executive director of nickel and base metals sales of Vale when he left the company for personal reasons at the end of 2008 and was replaced by Martins.
Ferreira served almost two years as the top Vale official in Canada, starting when the Brazilian mining giant finalized its purchase of Inco in January 2007. He had originally joined Vale in 1977. In 1998 he was appointed executive officer of commerce and finance at Vale do Rio Doce Alumínio S.A.-ALUVALE, a holding company of Vale that was merged into Vale in December 2003. Much of his experience is in aluminum and ferroalloys.
Martins was appointed as president and CEO of its subsidiary in Canada in December 2008. He has worked for Vale since 1985. Martins holds a bachelor's degree in economics from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) and a master's degree in management from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (IEAD). He has attended other executive education programs at INSEAD's European campus in Fontainebleau in France, an hour away from Paris, and at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
Valepar SA, the company that controls Vale, is owned by Previ, the employee pension fund of state-controlled Banco do Brasil SA; Bradespar SA, an industrial holding company; Mitsui & Co, Japan's second-largest trading company; BNDES Participações SA, or BNDESpar, and Elétron.
Created on June 1, 1942 by Brazilian dictator Getulio Vargas, Vale was privatized on May 7, 1997. Vargas created Vale in 1942 to supply steelmaker Siderúrgica Nacional as part of a drive to industrialize the country. The controlling shareholders of Valepar are Litel, Bradespar, BNDESpar, Mitsui and Elétron.
BNDESpar is a subsidiary of the Brazilian state-owned development bank. In addition to the BNDESpar stake and the ruling Workers Party's ties to the pension funds' management, the Brazilian government owns 12 so-called "golden shares" in Vale that gives it veto power over corporate decisions.
The golden shares stem from the 1997 privatization of Vale. When golden shares come into play, a government or other entity holding them maintains certain privileges, which secure a more favorable situation than the other shareholders.
Valepar is essentially a joint venture between state and private sector interests and holds about 53 per cent of Vale's voting capital. Previ and Funcef, the pension funds of state-run banks Banco do Brasil SA and Caixa Economica Federal, hold 49 percent of Valepar along with Petros, the retirement fund for government-controlled oil producer Petroleo Brasileiro SA. Previ controls Litel, while BNDESpar owns 11.5 per cent.
From the private sector, Bradespar SA, part of the Bradesco group owns 21.21 per cent of Valepar, and Mitsui & Co. Ltd. owns 18.2 per cent. While state-owned Litel and BNDESpar together have a majority stake in Valepar, a shareholder agreement means major decisions also require support from at least one of the two private-sector partners, Mitsui and Bradesco.
Poppinga was born in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. He holds a master's degree in business administration from Fundacao Dom Cabral in Brazil. He received a degree in geology from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in 1980 and Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg in Erlangen, Germany and a post-graduate degree in geology and mine engineering from Clausthal University of Technology in Clausthal-Zellerfeld Germany in 1984, with specialist diplomas in geo-statistics from the Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto in Minas Gerais, Brazil, and strategic mega trends from Asia Focus, Kellogg Singapore.
He speaks four languages including Portuguese, English, German and French. He worked for S.A. Mineracao da Trindade (SAMITRI) from 1984 until it was acquired by Vale in 1999, when he joined Vale as commercial director and general manager of the iron ore business in New York for Vale subsidiary Rio Doce America before moving to Rio Doce International, Belgium where he led Vale's market and sales activities in Europe from 2000 to 2004. Between 2005 and 2007, he was president of Vale International S.A. in Switzerland, and from 2008 until the end of 2009 he was executive vice-president human resources at Vale (then Vale Inco) in Toronto.
In January 2010, Poppinga moved to Australia when he was named vice-president for base metals operations for the Asia and Pacific region where he was responsible for operations in Indonesia, New Caledonia, China and Japan.
Vale has mining operations on five continents in 38 countries. Its base metals business is headquartered in Toronto. Vale is the second largest mining company in the world by market capitalization.
