Reckitt Benckiser’s new chief executive promised on Tuesday to step up spending on its brands and improve performance after the British household goods maker cut its full-year sales forecast for a second time. “We are not pleased with where we are and we must consistently deliver,” Laxman Narasimhan, who took over from long-time CEO Rakesh Kapoor in September, said on his first call with the investment community. Narasimhan particularly lamented the performance of the firm’s Health business, its largest, where a failed product launch, the nearly $17 billion acquisition of Mead Johnson, and a temporary baby milk factory shutdown in the Netherlands, have all caused significant disruption, some lasting to this day.
