A former senior vice president at top Asian oil refinery Sinopec Corp has officially taken office as the new head of state-run Sinochem Group, officials at the two companies said on Tuesday.

Cai Xiyou, Sinopec's vice president in charge of oil trading and sales, replaces 61-year-old Liu Deshu, president of Sinochem Group since 1998. Liu will become chairman of the group, sources at Sinochem told Reuters.

Cai, 52, is a 30-year oil industry veteran and was previously a manager at Jinzhou and WEPEC refinery, head of Sinopec's fuel sales division, president of Sinopec's trading arm Unipec, and chairman of Sinopec Engineering (Group) Co Ltd .

Sinochem Group, formerly China's monopoly oil trader until 1993, has diversified businesses in oil refining, chemicals trading, oil and gas explorations and real estate development.

The group formally started operating a 240,000 barrels per day refinery in July in southeast China, the group's first fully owned oil refining asset in China.

The group reported an operating revenue of 466.9 billion yuan ($75.8 billion) and 10.87 billion yuan in profit last year, according to the company's website (www.sinochem.com).

Reporting by Chen Aizhu and Judy Hua