Tidewater elected Larry T. Rigdon chairman of the board effective 28 October. Rigdon replaces Thomas R. Bates Jr., who recently resigned from the board.
Rigdon has been a member of the Tidewater board of directors since August 2017. He has extensive prior experience as an executive at Tidewater. Rigdon served as interim CEO of Tidewater for the 5-month period ended March 2018 and had previously joined the company in 1992 upon the merger with Zapata Gulf Marine Corp. After successive roles of increasing responsibility, he left the company as executive vice president in 2002. He then founded and grew Rigdon Marine Corp. to an owner of 28 offshore service vessels, selling the company in June 2008 to GulfMark Offshore, where he became a board member thereof until 2010. Rigdon also currently serves as a director of Professional Rental Tools LLC.
Coincident with the merger of Tidewater and GulfMark in 2018, the Tidewater board was expanded from seven to 10 members. Since then, the board has been in a process of determining its optimal size and composition. The board determined that operational efficiency is a key success factor for the company as it addresses longstanding challenges facing the offshore supply vessel industry and executes on the opportunities afforded the industry’s best-capitalized and leading global operator. In this regard, the board is committed to lead by example and will “do more with less”. The board believes a smaller board will not only be more cost-effective, but will enable the board to be more responsive and efficient as it advances the company’s strategic goals. Accordingly, the board committed to a reduction in its size to seven members at the next annual meeting of stockholders.
The size of the board has been reduced from 10 to eight members effective immediately. The immediate reduction in board size is the result of the resignation of Thomas R. Bates Jr. and Steven L. Newman. These resignations were not the result of any known disagreements between the resigning directors and management or the board of Tidewater.
In connection with these changes, the board has appointed, effective immediately, Randee E. Day to be chairwoman of the Nominating & Governance Committee, Louis A. Raspino to be chairman of the Compensation Committee, and has confirmed Dick H. Fagerstal as chairman of the Audit Committee.
The seven directors that the Tidewater board intends to nominate for election at the 2020 annual meeting of stockholders are: Randee E. Day, Dick H. Fagerstal, Quintin V. Kneen, Louis A. Raspino, Larry T. Rigdon, Robert P. Tamburino, and Kenneth H. Traub.