ATLANTA - Retired Coca-Cola chairman and chief executive Douglas Ivester walked away with a golden parachute worth at least $US30 million ($62.3 million), according to documents filed by the beverage giant with the Securities Exchange Commission.
Ivester, whose brief tenure in the top Coca-Cola job coincided with a rocky period in
company history, will pocket three annual payments of $1.5 million and then $56,300 every month, beginning in 2002, until he and his wife die, Coca-Cola said in a proxy statement filed with the commission.
A proxy statement is a document that the commission requires companies to give their shareholders when asking them to designate others to vote on their behalf at corporate meetings and other functions.
The 52-year-old Ivester, who was formally replaced last month by Douglas Daft, was also awarded 335,000 restricted Coca-Cola shares that he otherwise would have lost by retiring at this time.
Ivester will also receive a monthly payment of $66,300 until March 2002 and an annual consulting fee of $675,000 from 2002 until 2007.
His annual salary last year was about $1.3 million.
Coca-Cola said the package was intended to reward the former chairman's "long and loyal service," his work to ensure a smooth transition to a new management team and his ongoing role as a consultant to the company.
It said the package was also designed "to preclude Ivester from competing with us in the non-alcoholic beverage industry."
In his 21/2 years at the helm of Coca-Cola, Ivester oversaw an embarrassing product collapse in the company's fortunes.
