New boss of Halas appointed

Mr Andrew Hoggard has been appointed to the newly created role of business leader for Halas Dental Limited which effectively sees the former 2IC of the company now responsible for overseeing the entire operations of Australia's largest dental supply retailer.

Halas is a wholly owned subsidiary of the publicly listed Australian Pharmaceutical Industries Limited (ASX:API) and Mr Hoggard formerly held the role of acting general manager after Chief Executive Officer Gordon Anderson resigned in July (Australasian Dental Practice Sep/Oct 2004).

"I am of course very excited to be given the role of running Halas Dental on a permanent basis," Mr Hoggard said, "and to now be able to enact all the plans we have been strategising with the key people within the organisation in the last few months on how to take the company to the next level.

"It is one thing to be the biggest in terms of turnover but our vision going forward is to also be the industry leader in customer service and support. I see the foundation of this in place already and to go further, we must act on the feedback from our customers, our team members and our suppliers to ensure greater success.

"We want to actively leverage the size of our organization and the skills, knowledge and experience of the great team of people who work at and with Halas to truly excel in all areas and ensure we are and remain the number one choice for dental practice, laboratories, government and educational institutions nationwide."

Mr Hoggard began his dental career in 1983 at Halas' sister company, Shalfoon Dental in Auckland, New Zealand. API acquired both companies from the family-owned Zuellig Group in September 2002. At that time, he held the position of general manager.

In November 2003, Mr Hoggard migrated to Australia with wife Sue and their three children to accept the role of Operations Manager at Halas Dental.