Laurence Drake named as new Daf Trucks MD

Laurence Drake has been appointed as managing director of Daf Trucks, succeeding Robin Easton.

Easton has been promoted to the role of assistant general manager operations for PACCAR Financial Corporation.

Drake has held a wide range of management positions in sales, credit, operations and business planning at Daf Trucks and PACCAR Financial Corporation during his career.

Russell Patmore will replace Drake in his current position of truck sales director, with all appointments effective from September 1. 

Patmore has spent 29 years at Daf, joining the company as a graduate management trainee. He has progressed through various sales roles with increasing levels of responsibility in both PACCAR Financial and Daf Trucks, culminating in his role as business planning director over the last two years.

Easton’s tenure in the MD role at DAF Trucks in the UK, followed two-and-a-half years as managing director of PACCAR India. During his time in the UK he has consolidated DAF Trucks market leading position, now secured for more than 20 years.

His new role at PACCAR will see him assume responsibility for its Mexican and Australian finance companies, collections and used equipment.

Daf is the European market leader in the tractor-unit segment, with a market share of no less than 19.8%. It has grown to be Europe's second largest brand in the heavy truck (16+ tonnes) segment too.

As in previous years, Daf was the market leader in the heavy segment in 2018 in the Netherlands (32%), the United Kingdom (26.5%), Poland (23.2%) and Hungary (32.6%).

The Dutch truck manufacturer was also the market leader in Belgium (22.1%), Bulgaria (19.9%) and the Czech Republic (19.5%). In Germany, Daf was once again the largest import brand, with a market share of 12.3%.

Daf is the market leader in the light trucks class in both the United Kingdom (32.0%) and in Ireland (18.2%).