Rightmove has just announced that Johan Svanström will be appointed chief executive officer and succeed Peter Brooks-Johnson, who will retire after the full year results.

Svanström brings significant experience of growing established business to business to consumer online marketplace businesses. Following his appointment as global president of Hotels.com and Expedia Affiliate Network brands in 2013, he served on the Expedia Group global leadership team and over five years grew revenues to over $3 billion and led direct teams of 1,500 people across four continents.

Svanström started at Expedia as one of the company’s first employees in Asia, where he led the effort to set up the company’s operations across the continent. He joined Expedia from McDonald’s Inc, where he led several successful major projects within the company’s Digital Innovation Group, having previously held CEO and leadership positions in telecommunications and internet start-ups. A Swedish national based in the UK, Johan currently serves as a Partner, EQT Growth Advisory Team, which is part of EQT, the global investment organisation. Johan has many years of experience as a Board Director of both public and private technology companies across multiple countries.

Brooks-Johnson will continue to lead the business and support an orderly transition until after the presentation of the 2022 full year financial results. Svanström will join Rightmove on 20 February 2023 as executive director and CEO designate and will be appointed CEO on 6 March 2023.

The Company continues to make good progress with the implementation of its strategy and trading in the year to date has been as expected. The Board’s expectations for the full year remain unchanged.

Andrew Fisher, chair said: “I would like to thank Peter for his outstanding leadership as CEO over the past five years and for his significant contribution to the Company throughout the past 16 years.  Under his leadership the Company has significantly increased value for our customers and home hunters, with time spent on Rightmove increasing from 11.7bn minutes in 2016, to over 18bn in 2021. This has delivered sustained growth for our shareholders, increasing annual revenues from £220 million to £304 million in the same period and returning more than £750 million through dividends and share buybacks.”

“I am delighted to welcome Johan, whose proven ability to scale established companies along with his digital acumen and experience of marketplaces will continue to add significant value for our customers, home hunters, shareholders and team.”

Svanström commented: “I’m very excited to join Rightmove and look forward to building on the Company’s strong position and partnership model together with the team. Technology continues to provide opportunities to grow markets and create efficiencies everywhere. Rightmove has a long runway of opportunities to innovate, digitise and create ever more value for users, customers, and the wider eco-system.”

Svanström is a non-executive director of each of RVRC Holding AB and BIMobject AB (Sweden) and was a Non-Executive Director of Parques Reunidos SA (Spain) until December 2019. No further information is required to be disclosed in relation to this Board appointment under Listing Rule 9.6.13.

Note: When first published this story carried an incorrect logo – for which we apologise.