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Wither Hills chief winemaker Brent Marris has quit his job with the Lion Nathan-owned winery.
Mr Marris has had a stormy time in the industry of late following allegations last year he created special batches of sauvignon blanc wine for award tastings.
The winery had its New Zealand International Wine Show gold medal withdrawn in the wake of the controversy.
Mr Marris was cleared of allegations that centred on a 2006 Wither Hills Sauvignon Blanc presenting slightly differently in bulk production batches found in supermarkets and the batch used for competition.
At the time Mr Marris said it was extremely difficult to identically match different batches and he had never intentionally used one batch above another for competitions.
He was a chief Air New Zealand wine competition judge but resigned from that position in December.
Lion Nathan chief executive Rob Murray said today Mr Marris had resigned as chief winemaker to focus on new opportunities with his Waihopai River vineyard development and his new brand, The Ned.
The liquor giant bought Wither Hills winery, in Marlborough's Wairau Valley, from Mr Marris and his father, John, in 2002 and kept the winemaker on to help grow the brand.
Mr Murray said Lion Nathan would continue to produce The Ned at Wither Hills winery and distribute the brand in New Zealand and Australia.
From next month another Wither Hills winemaker, Ben Glover, will step into the chief winemaker position.
- NZPA
