Unilever forced to slim fast

THE EARLY departure of Niall FitzGerald as chairman of Unilever comes as something of a jolt to the outside world. FitzGerald let his colleagues at the food giant know some time ago that he intended to leave so it is unfortunate that his parting of the waves comes at a time when the Anglo-Dutch giant has gone into reverse.

It is worth noting that the biggest sales disappointments came in the world's two most important markets - the United States and Europe. This is a threadbare performance at time of strong consumer recovery in America.

The venture into the world of Slim-Fast diets, at time when Atkins has been roaring away, has not been helpful. Nevertheless, the disclosure of Dr Robert Atkins' extraordinary death weight could be of some assistance in clawing back territory.

Still FitzGerald has to be credited with some good deal making. He sold off Unilever's speciality chemical business at a peak price to ICI and made a shrewd acquisition in America with the purchase of Bestfoods. The switch into up-market ice cream, in an aspirational age, is difficult to criticise.

He proved a worthy spokesman for the unfashionable pro- euro cause in Britain.

Unilever came unstuck in its failure to meet the rigorous growth targets set out in Path for Growth. The aim is to do better under the new French boss Patrick Cescau with promises to deliver robust value.

A simplified, less bureaucratic and unified board structure should assist. Unilever deserves some credit for improving its governance. Whether this will help the group sell more Hellmann's mayonnaise and BirdsEye fishfingers is an open question.

Barrett buzz

WHEN ONE thinks of the mess that Barclays was in when Matt Barrett took over as chief executive in 1999 one has to be impressed by the turnabout in the bank's fortunes. It may not be the 'big bank' it once claimed to be or a world class player like Citibank, but what it is doing it does well.

Given that growth has not been driven by merger benefits, as it has at Royal Bank of Scotland, HBOS and to a lesser extent HSBC, generating profits growth of 20% is fairly sprightly.

There is bound to be much focus on the bank's credit card business given Barrett's unhelpfully honest comments before the Treasury select committee. But what may be uncomfortable for consumers, who are paying over the odds, is terrific for shareholders who have seen a 17% uplift in profits.

It is not surprising therefore that the bank is aggressively pushing the Barclaycard brand in Europe and is eyeing up Providian in the US having already snapped up the British arm.

Think how many more customers Barclaycard might have were it to adopt a new low pricing strategy, rather than leaving that sector of the market to Egg and others.

Elsewhere, the performance of Barclays Capital, under Bob Diamond, and Barclays Global Investors (which seems to have avoided the market timing scandal) stand out alongside business banking. This despite all the moans about price fixing for small businesses.

Where do Barrett and his successor John Varley take the business from here? The Bank of America merger rumours have faded. But the facts of American banking mean that with the giants in the US reaching their regulatory limits on market share they may have to look overseas and Barclays has the brand to be a good target.

Barclays aims to infill in areas where it already has expanded including credit cards and Europe. Whether this will prove enough to maintain the pacy share price performance of recent months is unclear.

BT struggle

VODAFONE chief Sir Chris Gent told me not so long ago that within a decade 70% of all phone calls would be mobile. Looking at the declining turnover of BT, Britain's dominant fixed-line telecoms provider, the switch is having effect already. Sales and profits on the main business are under pressure, but not as much as some have predicted.

Not surprisingly Ben Verwaayen is concentrating on building new businesses include broadband connections where it has made impressive inroads. Less impressive is its effort to recolonise the mobile sector where it has only acquired some 28,000 customers since launching in November.

Contrast this with its former offshoot mm02, which in partnership with Tesco, has added 200,000 new customers in recent months. BT's decision to sell assets to pay down its debt may be costing it dearly as the cellular sector takes off.