Who will be making their mark in the coming year? TERRY MURDEN identifies a few likely headline makers
Paul Thwaite – chief executive, NatWest (Royal Bank of Scotland)
Paul Thwaite was promoted to the top job in February to replace Alison Rose following her ‘debanking” misjudgement, and is blessed with the stars finally beginning to align for the bank after its long recovery from the 2008 financial crash.
He told a global banking summit last month that the bank is likely to pursue an acquisitions strategy in the new year, following its £125 million purchase of Edinburgh-based Sainsbury’s Bank in June.
NatWest has certainly won the support of investors who drove its shares to their best year on the stock market for more than three decades. They soared by 83% in 2024 – taking total returns, including dividends, to 95%.
The government is expected to sell its last tranche of shares in the bank in the first half of 2025, enabling it to return fully to the private sector for the first time since the taxpayer bailout that saved it.
The Treasury’s stake has fallen sharply from around 38% in December 2023 to just under 10%.
If only Mr Thwaite could be persuaded to restore the RBS name. After all, the NatWest brand has no presence in Scotland, yet its headquarters (allegedly) remains in Edinburgh. ‘NatWest RBS’, anyone?
Michelle Ferguson – director, CBI Scotland
A social enterprise leader and management consultant, Glasgow-born Michelle Ferguson‘s appointment ended a long search to replace Tracy Black who stepped up to to strategy director and devolved nations ambassador.
Mags Simpson, who has been interim director since April last year, will revert to her role as director of policy.
Ms Ferguson, 59, has been running her own firm in Scotland, Crown Management Consulting, for the past year.
She will assist in the rebuilding work which is being overseen by CBI chairman Rupert Soames and chief executive Rain Newton-Smith following the misbehaviour scandal at the organisation’s London HQ that threatened its future.
A packed CBI Scotland lunch in Edinburgh last summer and a well-attended annual dinner in Glasgow suggests the business community has restored is faith in the group.
Prof Sir Jim McDonald – chairman, Scottish Enterprise
Another long search ended with the agency hiring the retiring Strathclyde University principal and vice chancellor Prof Jim McDonald, who takes over two-and-a-half years after Lord Smith’s tenure ended.
Prof McDonald’s appointment, which was largely unreported by other media, will allow him to bring other roles in business and academia to the agency’s operations. He co-chairs, with the First Minister, the Scottish Energy Advisory Board and led the recent publication of two national reports on Scotland’s Innovation Strategy and opportunities for Floating Offshore Wind in Scotland.
He has been involved in several University entrepreneurial start-up and spin-out tech companies and has significant corporate non-exec director experience, including with FTSE-100 and NASDAQ listed companies.
Lena Wilson – chairman First Group, senior independent director at NatWest
As Scottish Enterprise gets a new chair, a former chief executive, Lena Wilson, takes over as chairman of transport company FirstGroup.
Ms Wilson, who also sits on the board of NatWest, was chief executive of Scottish Enterprise from 2009 to 2017 and prior to that, was a senior investment adviser to the World Bank in Washington DC.
She has held roles on listed and private companies for more than a decade, serving on the boards of Scottish Power Renewables and Intertek Group, and has chaired AGS Airports, owner of Glasgow and Aberdeen airports.
At NatWest bank, trading as Royal Bank of Scotland north of the border, she chairs the remuneration committee and at the end of the year was elevated to senior independent director.
At First Group she will be aiming to apply her public and private sector experience to the reshaping of bus and rail services on both sides of the border.
Juergen Maier – chairman, Great British Energy
Juergen Maier, who was appointed to the new Aberdeen-based quango in July, has already created headlines, both positive and negative, before a pound has been invested in renewables projects.
The former Siemens UK chief executive has been criticised for a lack of detail on how GBE will be staffed and for taking an office in Manchester, which prompted indignant protests from, among others, Ash Regan of the Alba Party and the Tory party’s Douglas Lumsden.
Of course, it is not unusual for chairs and other non-executive directors to live in places far from the companies they represent, but the critics are baying for blood if GBE is not to be seen as a brass-plate department for doing very little.
A chief executive is still to be appointed and will, one expects, be based in Aberdeen.
Tracey Davidson – chief executive, Hampden & Co
Hampden & Co, the Edinburgh-based private bank, appointed Tracey Davidson as chief executive following the retirement of Graeme Hartop after 11 years in the role.
She joined in the autumn from Handelsbanken UK where she was Deputy CEO and chair of Handelsbanken Wealth & Asset Management, prompting sources to speculate on whether the bank saw this as a route to expansion and keeping clients’ money in-house.
In the meantime, Ms Davidson will be focused on driving the bottom line. First half profits fell despite significant demand across its range of services.
The bank said pre-tax profit came in at £4.2m compared with £5.1m in the first half of 2023, reflecting the higher cost of deposits.
Lucy Dimes – chief executive, Iomart
Glasgow-based cloud computing firm Iomart has been a stalwart of the Scottish tech sector and counts some of the country’s best-known leaders among its roll-call of directors, including Nick Kuenssberg, Ian Steele and Ian Ritchie.
Lucy Dimes arrived in 2022 as chair and stepped in as chief executive in September 2023. She is now stamping her own identity on the company with a transformational acquisition in November which she described as a “shot in the arm” that will extend it further into growth markets.
Order bookings in the half year were at record levels, being around 30% ahead of the same period last year.
Daily Business revealed that Schroders Investment Management acquired a 7% stake in the company after buying 8.4 million shares from Liontrust Asset Management, its entire holding in the AIM-quoted business.
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