Lululemon COO to leave for luggage maker Away

(Reuters) – Canadian athleisure apparel maker Lululemon Athletica Inc’s Chief Operating Officer, Stuart Haselden, will leave in January to head privately owned luggage maker Away.

Haselden joined Vancouver-based Lululemon as chief financial officer in 2015 from peer J Crew and became the COO in May 2017.

He was part of the team that guided the company after Laurent Potdevin’s exit as chief executive officer in February 2018 until Calvin McDonald took charge in July last year.

Haselden, a former U.S. army captain, will join Away co-founders Steph Korey and Jen Rubio on the board in January, with current CEO Korey becoming the executive chairman.

Haselden is the latest major hire by the U.S. startup and follows the addition of eight new vice presidents and doubling of the company’s workforce to 600 employees worldwide in 2019.

Away, founded in 2016, said it is now worth $1.4 billion after a $100 million Series D investment led by Wellington Management this year.

Lululemon is scheduled to report third-quarter results on Wednesday after the bell.

(Reporting by Praveen Paramasivam in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)