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American Water Works Company, Inc. (NYSE: AWK) the largest publicly-traded U.S. water and wastewater utility company, announced that William Varley, its Chief Growth Officer, retired effective today due to health reasons. “I want to thank Bill for all of his contributions to our company,” said Walter Lynch, president and CEO of American Water. “Bill came out of retirement last year and worked with our state leadership and business development teams to further enhance our growth strategy, which is successfully being executed across our footprint.” American Water’s growth strategy will continue to focus on operating in states where it can best serve customers, drive efficiencies, and continue to grow the regulated businesses. As of May 1, 2021, American Water has more than 86,000 customer connections under agreement across 8 different states, with more than 1.2 million customer connection opportunities in its growth pipeline. Earlier this year, Pennsylvania American Water also announced what would be the largest municipal acquisition in its history, with a signed agreement to acquire the wastewater treatment and collection system for the City of York, Pennsylvania. This acquisition, when closed, would add an equivalent customer connection total of more than 45,000. “The continued, successful execution of our growth strategy is why our 2021 to 2025 expected earnings growth from regulated acquisitions was raised to one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half percent earlier this year,” added Lynch. “Our state teams, with corporate support, are delivering on the fundamentals like acquisitions in our target range of 5,000 to 50,000 customers and consideration for larger acquisitions; wastewater acquisitions in or near our water footprint; and continued engagement on legislative and regulatory policy to benefit customers.” “With our deeply experienced state leadership and a proven business development team, we are well positioned to continue our growth strategy by providing water and wastewater solutions for the long-term,” added Lynch. Corporate business development efforts will be led by Robert Stoy, American Water’s Vice President of Business Development, in the interim, until a replacement for Varley is identified. Stoy has nearly 20 years of experience in corporate finance, project finance, and mergers and acquisitions. He joined American Water in 2018 as Director of Business Development. He also served as Assistant Treasurer at American Water prior to his current role as Vice President of Business Development. Prior to joining American Water, Stoy held various business development roles including at Wells Fargo Securities. His broad experience includes many multimillion-dollar transactions within the utilities industry and related infrastructure sectors.