Sara Lee Announces New CFO of North American Business

Sara Lee Corp. (NYSE:SLE) announced Thursday that Maria Henry has been named chief financial officer of Sara Lee North America operations, a spin-off of the International Coffee and Tea business to be complete in the spring of 2012.

"Maria is a true asset to our leadership team," said Fraleigh. "She's an experienced, results-oriented finance executive who has worked with large multinational organizations and small and mid-sized companies, both public and private.

I expect her to quickly contribute to our business as we continue to prepare for our debut as a stand-alone, publicly-traded company."

Henry, 44, previously served as executive vice president and chief financial officer at Culligan International.

Prior to Culligan, Henry was the chief financial officer for Vastera, a global trade management solutions company. She has also held various leadership positions for private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice's portfolio companies, U.S. Office Products, and Wang Global.

Henry began her career at General Electric (NYSE:GE), where she participated in GE's Financial Management Training program.