Pizza Hut's Vipul Chawla to take over Seah Kian Peng as group CEO at FairPrice

SINGAPORE — FairPrice Group will get a new group CEO in early April, as Mr Seah Kian Peng — who currently holds the post — steps down to focus on driving growth across NTUC Enterprises’ social enterprise clusters.

Mr Seah has helmed dual roles as group CEO of NTUC Enterprise and FairPrice Group since 2019.

Mr Vipul Chawla, who is currently president of Pizza Hut International, will take over the reins at FairPrice Group on Apr 5, said FairPrice Group and NTUC Enterprise in a media release on Thursday (Feb 17).

Mr Seah will remain group CEO at NTUC Enterprise as well as take on the additional roles of deputy chairman of FairPrice Group and chairman of FairPrice Foundation. His new appointments also take effect on Apr 5.

The NTUC Enterprise group of social enterprises includes NTUC FairPrice, NTUC First Campus, NTUC Foodfare, NTUC Health and NTUC Income.

NTUC Enterprise and FairPrice Group said that the leadership changes are part of efforts to further strengthen the "core and talents" in its management team.

A global search was carried out to identify a replacement for group CEO at FairPrice Group, and had included internal as well as external candidates.

"Following a global search, we identified Vipul as the best person for the job and his strengths will augment the leadership team," said Mr Bobby Chin, FairPrice Group board chairman.

Mr Seah has been with FairPrice for 22 years, starting as chief operating officer in 2001 and becoming CEO of NTUC FairPrice in 2016.

He was appointed group CEO in 2019 when FairPrice Group was formed. He was also asked to take on the group CEO role at NTUC Enterprise the same year.

Under Mr Seah's leadership at FairPrice, new formats such as FairPrice Xtra and FairPrice Finest were introduced, said the release.

"Together with the team, he strengthened FairPrice’s position as the number one supermarket in Singapore turning an annual revenue of less than S$1 billion when he joined to over S$4 billion today," said the release.

"He successfully steered FPG through the last two years amidst the challenges of the pandemic, and accelerated the omni-vertical and omni-channel business, tapping on new growth opportunities whilst strengthening its core businesses and supply chain," it added.

Mr Chawla, 54, is joining FairPrice Group from Yum! Brands. He was previously the vice president and chief marketing officer at KFC Asia (Singapore) in 2011 and became president of Pizza Hut International in 2018.

During his time as Pizza Hut president, Mr Chawla oversaw global markets spanning more than 100 countries with a revenue of US$7.5 billion and 345,000 employees, said the release.

Prior to Yum! Brands, Mr Chawla was with Unilever from 1993 to 2011.

The release said that Mr Chawla, a Singaporean, has been involved with the labour movement in the past as part of NTUC’s “U Circle of Friends” to promote the talent pool in Singapore.

He has also worked with food banks in Singapore through his time in Yum!.

“Vipul is not new to the labour movement ... I look forward to him continuing to drive our social mission with initiatives that help to moderate the cost of living for our workers and their families," said Mr Ng Chee Meng, NTUC secretary-general. CNA