(Reuters) - Energy suppliers SSE Plc (L:SSE) and Innogy SE (DE:IGY) said on Friday Martin Read would take over as chairman of the new company resulting from the merger of their UK retail units.
Read is a former chairman of Laird Plc (OTC:LARRF) and will begin his role after the merger of SSE's retail power unit and German-listed Innogy's Npower.
The appointment comes a month after the two energy utilities received provisional approval for the deal from Britain's Competition and Markets Authority.
Britain's energy market, which is dominated by the so-called Big Six players, has come under severe regulatory scrutiny and recently Theresa May's government put a price cap on what she had earlier termed "rip-off" energy prices.
The SSE-Npower deal will reduce the Big Six to five and create UK's second-largest retail power provider, with a 23 percent market share - only behind Centrica's (L:CNA) British Gas.