PHIL
MALE
.CV

A
LITTLE
CORNER

Summary

I was one of the founders of a ground-breaking digital news agency straight out of University and spent the early part of my career in the media industry.

From there I joined the team at Internet pioneer Demon Internet as CTO and began my 14 years as an Executive in the Internet and telecoms sector.

I did my first IPO at the age of 33, one of the youngest FTSE Executives in history, and served for 11 years in the 100/250.

Today, I work mainly with private equity as a retained industrial partner and advisor, as well as a Non-Executive Director and Chair.

Biography

I have been involved in the development of technology, media and telecoms services in the UK for more than 30 years.

I was one of the founders of a digital media business that pioneered the production of press-ready digital newspaper pages after graduating with a degree in Computing Science from Imperial College.

We sold that company to the UK's national news agency The Press Association, and I stayed on to help build their new media division.

From there I joined Internet pioneer Demon Internet as CTO, eventually floating that business as telecoms operator THUS where as COO and one of the youngest FTSE Executives in history I saw it grow into a FTSE100 company.

In 2008 I joined Cable&Wireless Worldwide following their acquisition of THUS as CTO, and then as CSO managed their subsequent demerger and IPO process.

Since 2010 I have been working with private equity companies as an advisor, Non-Executive Director and Chair across a broad portfolio of technology-enabled companies.

More than 30 years' Board experience, as an Executive, Non-Executive and Chair in private, listed, charity and government organisations.
8 years' Executive experience in the Media sector, 14 in Telecoms and Internet - 11 in the FTSE100/250.
Two £multi-billion FTSE IPO's, 34 M&A transactions - 3 Class 1 and 26 with Private Equity.
UK, European and Global experience in companies from start-ups to FTSE100 with a strong-growth advanced-technology profile.

Executive Roles

My Executive roles start in media and on into Internet and telecoms, all companies with a strong technology focus.


1988-92 CNS
Pioneers of digital content		 Founder, CTO
1992-96 The Press Association
UK national news agency		 CTO & Strategy
1996-99 Demon Internet
One of the first ISP's		 CTO
1999-08 THUS Group plc
FTSE100 next-generation carrier		 COO
2008-10 C&W Worldwide plc
FTSE100 global carrier		 CTO, CSO
2010-15 UK2 Group
Global hosting		 Chair, CEO

Non-Executive Roles

I have served as a Non-Executive Director and Chair on the boards of several companies, often, but not always, in partnership with private equity.


2009-11 intY
Wholesale cloud applications		 NED
2011-15 Adapt
Enterprise managed hosting services		 Chair, Investor
2011- JT Global
Channel Islands telecommunications		 NED, Chair
2014- Data Communications Company
Smart meters for the UK		 SID

Non-Executive Roles, continued...


2015-18 Kondor
Consumer electronics distribution		 NED, Investor
2015-17 Zitcom Group
Enterprise and SME Danish hosting		 NED, Investor
2015-17 Fibercore
Speciality fibre optic engineering		 NED, Investor
2015-19 Comic Relief Ltd
Positive change through entertainment		 NED
2017- Virtual1
Wholesale telecoms services		 NED, Investor

Non-Executive Roles, continued...


2018- Miss Group
Global SME and consumer hosting		 Chair, Investor
2018- Zen Internet
UK Independent ISP		 NED
2019- Ascent Software
Software development and data analytics		 NED, Investor
2020- ROI Media
Marketing and advertising specialists		 Chair, Investor
2020- Sliide
Engaging content for smartphone users		 NED, Investor

Not-For-Profit Roles

I have a few advisory, education, charity and not-for-profit roles - I also do a number of private and public speaking engagements each year. Some of those are necessarily confidential, however here is a selection of some past positions.


2013-19 Counterpoint
Global risk analaysis		 Advisor
2014-20 Cambridge University, Judge
Cybersecruity and Social Media		 Lecturer
2015-19 Comic Relief Ltd
Positive change through entertainment		 NED
2015-17 JANET Commercial
UK's academic network - SuperJanet		 NED
There are times in life when people must know when not to let go. Balloons are designed to teach small children this. Terry Pratchett

A little more information...

You can find some more information below about the various companies I've worked for as an Executive.

There are references and links throughout, but if you would like to get in touch then reach out on one of the social media platforms.

1988-92 Computer Newspaper Services

Founder

One of two founding directors of CNS after leaving university. We were a start-up that pioneered electronic content production in the media industry, including the introduction of direct-to-plate, electronic page delivery and camera-ready information services to the regional and national press.

Our products included TV and financial listings, sports results, racing and weather services - typographically complex, time critical and data-intensive pages all delivered electronically to clients to suit their exact editorial and technical requirements to deadline, typically as complete print-ready pages sent directly to the press.

Prior to CNS these pages were usually composed by hand.

We created the 7-day TV listings market at the time multi-channel TV was emerging in the UK and were a key content and technical partner for Teletext UK, the commercial teletext service, producing all their regional TV listings and the now-next service.

We grew rapidly, within three years producing tens of thousands of newspaper pages a year and distributing them to almost every media outlet in the UK.

CNS was one of the first UK companies to be on the Internet, and was operating prototype digital news services in the early 90's from the offices in Howden. It was also very active in the open source movement.

We sold the business to The Press Association in 1992 and it continues to operate to this day.

1992-96 PA New Media

CTO, Strategy Director

The Press Association is the national news agency of the UK, it delivers a continuous feed of content via a national newswire and the Internet, including text, images, video and data into newsrooms around the world.

This ranges from breaking news, to international real-time sports and financial data, entertainment guides, TV listings and archived images.

PA acquired CNS to form PA New Media in 1992 as part of it's strategy to embrace emerging digital technology.

As Technical Director of New Media and latterly as Director of Strategy I was intimately involved in more than 200 new information and media products for print, broadcast and online media in the following years.

These included numerous real-time news, sports, and data operations including Teletext / Ceefax / Skytext services, the introduction of computer scoring to Cricket, Saturday afternoon football services such as Grandstand and the Saturday Pink's, and the launch of many high profile Internet properties (for example Sporting Life, Freeserve, MSN, Football365, CricInfo, Nationwide Football, and The Electronic Telegraph).

One of the many interesting projects was the introduction of electronic cricket scoring in association with the TCCB. We were fortunate to be testing the software when Brian Lara hit his world-record breaking 501, and we captured every ball he hit and exactly where he placed it in real time.

PA New Media was subsequently re-branded as Ananova and ultimately sold to Orange.

96-99 Demon Internet

CTO

I joined Demon Internet as CTO responsible for all operational, customer service and technical areas of the business.

This followed a long informal association with Demon dating back to 1992 - the team that originally designed, built and launched one of the UK’s first commercial ISP's.

Aside from the tenner-a-month dial-up ISP service Demon was famous for, we were one of the original founders of the London Internet Exchange, launched Beeb.net with BBC Worldwide and had an agreement with Apple to be the sole ISP on all Macintosh computers sold in the UK.

At our peak we were the largest ISP in Europe.

We produced the UK's most widely read Internet magazine, hosted half of the UK's websites, were one of the largest terminators of domestic telephony traffic in the UK, and involved in some of the defining moments of the emerging Internet regulatory envrionment.

Demon was successfully sold to ScottishTelecom, a subsidiary of ScottishPower plc, following a competitive process.

The historical importance of Demon Internet in the development of the UK Internet industry should never be underestimated - and not just from a technical and regulatory perspective. The Demon marketing teams were also never afraid to push the limits.

The Demon service ultimately remained active until 2019.

99-08 THUS plc

COO

Appointed to the ScottishTelecom board following the acquisition of Demon Internet in July 1999 to drive the £2bn de-merger and IPO process from ScottishPower plc culminating in a listing on the London Stock Exchange (FTSE250 and subsequently FTSE100) and TechMark indices in November 1999 as THUS Group plc.

At the age of 33, I was one of the youngest FTSE Executive Directors in history. Our IPO was hugely over-subscribed, our roadshow took in most of Europe and the USA, and we had nearly 80 analysts covering our progress.

I represented THUS on the board of NGNuk, the Ofcom body that established the principles for the roll out of broadband and next generation networks.

THUS was the first telecommunications company to deploy a next-generation fibre-optic network in the UK, and the first to deploy a full MPLS capability nationally.

We completed multiple acquisitions over the next six years, including the Class 1 acquisitions of Your Comms and Legend Communications plc, and won numerous national awards.

THUS pioneered many new next-generation communication services, often working closely with others such as OnDigital and BSkyB's WapTV with whom we helped develop the now familiar interactive-TV 'Red Button' services.

THUS was acquired by Cable&Wireless plc in October 2008.

08-10 CWW plc

CTO, CSO

Joined Cable&Wireless EAUS as part of the integration team for THUS Group plc, and took responsibility for customer services, and subsequently for global operations as CTO.

Cable&Wireless EAUS was a global telecommunications company with operational infrastructure around the world. This included the international sub-sea cable networks and large centres in Europe, Asia and India.

In January 2010, following a strategic review, we prepared the division for de-merger from Cable&Wireless plc and subsequent full listed company operations as Cable&Wireless Worldwide. I managed the de-merger process and subsequent IPO which completed with full entry to the London Stock Exchange (FTSE100) in March 2010 and saw the FTSE100 briefly become the FTSE101.

10-15 UK2 Group

Chair, CEO

UK2 Group is a multinational hosting and Internet infrastructure business with operations in numerous countries around the world - providing hosted applications and server platforms for consumer and SME markets.

I worked with LDC in acquiring the business, initially joining as Executive Chair and overseeing the spin-off of OnApp - a virtualisation and orchestration software business. I then took over as CEO of UK2 Group.

UK2 operated multiple brands in the hosting market, from mass consumer, SME and domain brands, through to VPS and dedicated server brands. It was one of the first to market with VPS technology as VPS.net and had a specialist dedicated server product marketed as 100TB.

Thanks For Stopping By...

I hope you found something of interest, if not then at least you know what is here.

If you do want to reach out and get in contact, the best way is through one of the social media platforms - take your pick, I check them all occasionally.

There is no secret ingredient.
It's just you. Po, Kung Fu Panda