Management
Management structure
Arricano Real Estate Plc, being a public company limited by shares, is headed by the Board of Directors. Composition of the Board of Directors is set out in the company's Articles of Association and was facilitated by the shareholders of the company in accordance with applicable laws, requirements and best corporate governance practices. The Board comprises of three independent and two non-independent non-executive Directors and one executive Director. The Directors report to the shareholders about the performance of the Group, its achievements and plans. The Directors may be appointed and dismissed by the shareholders of the company, all in accordance with the provisions of the Articles of Association.
The Company has assembled a strong Board comprised of individuals who together have relevant sector experience as well as prior experience on boards of publicly listed companies. The Board is responsible for key decisions relating to the Group’s activities, including approval of the Group’s long-term business strategy and annual business plans. The Board comprises of six Directors details of whom, together with details of the relevant sub-committees can be found here.
The Board has established an audit committee with formally delegated duties and responsibilities, comprising at least two independent non-executive Directors. The audit committee meets at least twice a year and is responsible for ensuring that the financial performance of the Company is properly reported and monitored, including reviews of the annual and interim accounts, announcement of results, internal control systems and procedures, and accounting policies.
The Board has also established a remuneration committee with formally delegated duties and responsibilities, comprising at least two Independent Non-executive Directors. The remuneration committee also meets at least twice a year and is responsible for setting the remuneration policy for the executives of the Company.
The Board also comprises of an executive Board Member – Chief Executive Officer, who is appointed by the Board upon recommendations of the shareholders or the Board Members. Chief Executive Officer, being the Executive Member of the Board, forms the Management Board, which consists of managers responsible for the activity of the Group in respective spheres.
The Group’s management team combines extensive industry and market experience (of both private and publicly listed companies) with financial and management expertise, and its members have been involved with the real estate industry for, on average, more than 10 years. The Group’s experienced in-house management team is dedicated to managing all of the internal processes of the Group and the whole process of setting up and running a centre from the initial selection and acquisition of sites to the operation of completed projects. The Group has developed, and continues to refine, a management structure that is focused on enhancing accountability and decision making processes. The team consists of local Ukrainian and international managers, all with significant experience and familiarity with Ukrainian and international real estate markets.
Urmas Somelar currently acts as a management consultant, working through his private company US Juhtimise. Previously Urmas worked for over 20 years in banking, predominantly in the credit and credit risk areas. He has extensive knowledge of credit analysis, corporate restructuring and repossessed asset turnaround. Between 2009 and 2015 Urmas built up and led different units within the Swedbank Group, working in the Baltics as well as Russia and Ukraine. Between 2015 and 2017, Urmas acted as the CEO at Riigi Kinnisvara, an Estonian state real estate property and facility management company, which owns and manages more than 1.2 million square metres of office and specialised property.
Volodymyr Tymochko is a Managing Director of Private Equity, and a Partner at Dragon Capital. At this position he is responsible for investment management of DUPD – an AIM-listed property investment company with 10 active real estate projects in Ukraine. In 2007, Volodymyr was appointed a Director at Dragon Asset Management (“Dragon AM”), where he was in charge of deal sourcing and management of DUPD’s real estate projects. Prior to joining Dragon AM Volodymyr was an Associate Director for Consulting and Investment Services at Colliers International. Volodymyr graduated from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and holds an MA degree in Economic Theory.
Mykhailo Merkulov graduated from Romano-Germanic Philology Department of Kharkov State University in 1996, and received an MBA from Manchester Business School in the UK in 2007. Mykhailo has 20 years’ experience across different industries operating in Central and Eastern Europe countries (Ukraine, Russia, Bulgaria, Serbia, Slovenia and Austria). His career started in 1996 when he joined McDonald’s, in Ukraine, where he worked for 9 years on various middle-level and, later, top management positions. After nine years of being with McDonald’s, Mykhailo joined Food Star (Russia) in the capacity of Chief Executive Officer. In 2007 Mykhailo joined Erste Group Immorent AG in Ukraine, a specialist in real estate financing, infrastructure financing and project development, as Managing Director. In 2011 he became Regional Director for the Eastern European Group (Ukraine, Poland, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Slovenia). As of September 8, 2014, Mykhailo Merkulov has been appointed to the position of the Chief Executive Officer of Arricano Real Estate plc and as of 16 April 2015 was appointed to hold the position of the Director of the Board. His competence covers strategic planning and the Company’s business operations control.
Juri Pold as a construction and development professional has more than 20 years of experience working for European companies and respectively the best practices and best European approaches to construction of civil (non-residential) projects. Juri graduated from the Estonian Agricultural University as a civil engineer in 1991. Mr Pold started his professional career in 1990 as project manager. In 1997 Juri joined Skanska, a world leading project development and construction group based in Sweden. Among the main achievements of Juri in Skanska was development of several infrastructural nationwide projects in Finland and Estonia.
Since 2007 Juri acted as a construction director of Expert Capital Management OU: it was an active start of expanding the development projects of shopping malls in Ukraine. Mr Pold occupied the position of construction director till 2009. During this period, Juri in cooperation with the team of international professionals engaged by Expert Capital Management OU worked on commercial real estate projects in Ukraine and Estonia. As a result, one of the first professional malls named - “Sun Gallery” Shopping and Entertainment Center was opened in 2008 in Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine.
In 2013 Mr Pold continued his career as a consultant, where his competence in construction and investments support the companies’ development strategies.
By joining the Board of Directors of Arricano Real Estate Plc Mr. Juri Pold has strengthened the team of professionals engaged in management and supervision of the Company’s strategic development and expansion with responsibility primarily for management of certain assets of Arricano.
Frank Lewis has a wealth of public company experience, having served as Non-Executive Chairman and Director for a number of international publicly-quoted firms with interests across Europe, the Far East, Middle East and Africa, which has given him a sound understanding of different business cultures and working practices, as well as considerable expertise in numerous business sectors.
In addition to his non-executive roles, Frank had over 25 years of public and private company boardroom-level experience, including as Finance Director, CEO and Chairman, during which time he has been involved in numerous areas of business, including strategic planning, growth management, IPOs, corporate governance and regulatory compliance.
He is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales, and was previously a member of the AIM Advisory Council, which advises the London Stock Exchange on matters relating to the AIM market.
Since October 2013, the Board of Directors established the operation of the following two committees: the Audit Committee and the Remuneration Committee. The Audit Committee comprises of three non-executive directors. It is chaired by Mr. Frank Lewis; Mr. Urmas Somelar and Mr. Volodymyr Tymochko are the members. The Remuneration Committee comprises of three non-executive directors. It is chaired by Mr. Frank Lewis; Mr. Urmas Somelar and Mr. Volodymyr Tymochko are the other members.
Mikhail Merkulov graduated from Romano-Germanic Philology Department of Kharkov State University in 1996, and received an MBA from Manchester Business School in the UK in 2007.
Mikhail has 20 years’ experience across different industries operating in Central and Eastern Europe countries (Ukraine, Russia, Bulgaria, Serbia, Slovenia and Austria). His career started in 1996 when he joined McDonald’s, in Ukraine, where he worked for 9 years on various middle-level and, later, top management positions. After nine years of being with McDonald’s, Mikhail joined Food Star (Russia) in the capacity of Chief Executive Officer. In 2007 Mikhail joined Erste Group Immorent AG in Ukraine, a specialist in real estate financing, infrastructure financing and project development, as Managing Director. In 2011 he became Regional Director for the Eastern European Group (Ukraine, Poland, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Slovenia).
September 8, 2014, Mikhail Merkulov has been appointed to the position of the Chief Executive Officer of Arricano Real Estate plc. His competence covers strategic planning and the company’s business operations control.
In 2004 Svetlana Renkas graduated with honours from the Legal Department of the Kiev National University and received the degree of Master of Laws.
Svetlana has a ten-year track record in legal practice in the areas of land, civil, economic, investment, corporate and adjective law. She also worked in the capacity of civil servant.
Since 2010 Svetlana has been concentrating her efforts on retail legal practice and has been part of Arricano team since 2012.
Ms Renkas’ main activities are focused on ensuring smooth and efficient legal operations of Arricano Group in Ukraine.
Nataliya joined Arricano as Head of Marketing in March 2015. She has more than fifteen years of experience in the marketing of commercial real estate, developing successful projects and long term marketing strategies, working as a marketing consultant. Prior to Arricano Nataliya was Chief Marketing Officer for a group of companies developing one of the most challenging realty projects in Kiev – Darynok marketplace. In her previous career in property management Nataliya started in 2003 as a Commercial Director of Alta Center, one of the first Ukrainian shopping malls. As an experienced and results-orientated manager, her key challenges are to enhance the marketing communication and implement efficient marketing tools in malls’ management.
Nataliya graduated from the Institute of foreign languages, Gorlivka, and later received degree in Economics and Marketing in European University and MIM, Kyiv.
From November 2015, Olexander Nemer heads IT department of Arricano. Area of his responsibility includes issues of designing the company development strategy and tactics in IT area, management of in-house IT projects, design and organization of IT infrastructure.
Before Arricano, Olexander had over 11 years of professional experience in different areas of business of EasteOne Group (international investment and consulting group) on various positions: PJSC MMC-STB #1 TV channel in Ukraine – head of IT Infrastructure Exploitation Team, StarLightMedia - #1 media group in Ukraine – Deputy IT Director.
Olexander’s professional achievement portfolio includes a number of successful large-scale IT projects.
Nemer Olexander in 2004 graduated from Dnipropetrovsk National Mining University with a degree in Power Supply of Industrial Enterprises.He successfully completed his studies in the areas of ITIL and COBI; when implementing the tasks, he observes PMBoKprinciples.
Anna Chubotina has assumed the office of Arricano Director of Retail Leasing Department from March 2016. Management of Leasing Department, development and implementation of plan package for optimization of business processes of retail space lease with a view to increase the company’s profitability, creation and implementation of shopping malls’ development strategies, efficient work with the existing tenants and involvement of new ones are key areas of Anna’s work.
Anna came to Arricano from JLL Ukraine where she held the office of Retail Space Department Head.
She has been working for over 15 years in the field of commercial real estate 9 of which were at JLL Ukraine. Anna’s professional portfolio includes working with such large players of retail property market as SvitLand Ukraine, King Cross & Komfort Invest, Arricano Real Estate, DCH Real Estate, Kray Property and such projects as Décor Service national furniture and décor network, Sky Mall shopping mall (Kyiv), Prospekt shopping mall (Kyiv), MFC Silver Breeze (Kyiv), Magellan shopping mall, (Kharkiv), Victoria Gardens shopping mall (Lviv) and others.
Anna graduated from Romano-Germanic Philology and Foreign Literature faculty of M. P. Dragomanov National Pedagogical University. Then she obtained degrees in Economics and Marketing at Kyiv National University of Trade and Economics.
Nikolai Yakimenko joined Arricano team in 2010 as the head of projects and programs. He was responsible for the construction works in the lease areas during Sky Mall shopping center construction, and he also managed RayON shopping center project. In 2012, Nikolai was appointed to the position of the head of the "Lukianivka" project. Since February 2016, Mr. Yakimenko has been working in the position of acting head of development. Before joining Arricano, Nikolai worked as a project portfolio manager in the sphere of commercial real estate in one of Ukrainian equity investment companies. Nikolai’s career in the field of commercial real estate started in 2005 in the position of regional development manager of the network operator of "Amstor" grocery hypermarkets in the "Smart-Holding" group of companies.
Nikolai graduated from the "Kyiv National Economic University named after Vadym Hetman"(Ukraine), where he obtained a master's degree in "Investment Management”.
Lauri Reinberg has more than 20 years of experience in financial management and planning on Eastern European real estate markets.
Lauri joined the Arricano team in October 2017 as the Head of Financial Control. Prior to his role at Arricano, Lauri served as CFO of Pocopay, a large digital banking company based in Estonia.
Over 14 he had been holding numerous senior finance roles at the Financial Department of Swedbank, including the CFO of Financial Restructuring and Recovery and the CFO of Swedbank’s Eastern European operations. Between 2007 and 2009, Lauri served as the CFO of Retail Real Estate S.A. in Ukraine (formerly named Expert Capital S.A.).
Lauri received his Master of Science degree in Business Administration from Estonian Business School in 2002 and Bachelor of Science degree from University of Tartu in 1995.
As CFO, Lauri Reinberg will oversee Arricano’s finance, accounting, financial planning & analysis, tax and treasury areas of the business.
Mrs. Tetiana Klimuk heads the Legal Department dealing with non-residents since April 2018.
Mrs. Klimuk has more than 9 years of legal practice experience, in particular in corporate and commercial law, banking and financial law, legal compliance, legal assistance of corporate governance procedures, had practice in legal department of Ukrainian bank, in legal department of large media-holding and provided consulting services in education projects.
Tetiana combines her in-depth understanding of the business needs of the main players in commercial real estate development with work with the challenges faced by this business both at local and international levels in order to provide the Group with the most efficient legal support in its constant financial growth.
Mrs. Klimuk and her team are focused on processes and procedures connected with listing of Arricano’s shares on the AIM LSE, legal support for the corporate matters and economic activities with involvement non-residents of the Arricano Group, provide full scope legal support in work with the banks, in financing and refinancing transactions, legal support in risk management matters, contract negotiation and cross-border transactions.
Mrs. Klimuk joined the Arricano Group in July 2011.
She earned law background from the National University “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy" and obtained Master of Law degree (earlier she also received Bachelor of Law and the Specialist of Law degrees with honors).