Appointments: Driving force behind Zenith’s success joins Synergy Automotive board; Chairman appointed by corporate vehicle rental provider

ANDREW COPE, the man behind the success of vehicle leasing giant Zenith, is joining the board of vehicle leasing and finance credit broker Synergy Automotive.

A co-founder of Zenith in 1989, Mr Cope was instrumental in leading the company through five private equity buyouts between 2003-2014, before spearheading the MBO of incident management and roadside recovery specialist FMG a year after joining its board in 2014.

Working alongside Synergy Automotive MD and founder, Paul Parkinson, the non-executive director will help to shape the strategy and vision of the 23-strong business at Hornbeam Park in Harrogate.

Leasing more than £29m of vehicles at retail value in the last financial year, Synergy Automotive plans to increase that by over 30% to £42m this financial year.  

Synergy Automotive MD, Paul Parkinson, said: “Andrew’s appointment marks another milestone in Synergy’s development. Innovation, coupled with ongoing investment to deliver top class customer service, is instrumental to furthering our success and Andrew’s powerful track record will accelerate our wider goals and vision.

“Thanks go to KPMG’s Leeds corporate finance team, Christian Mayo and Graham Pearce, who have been instrumental in working with us throughout the last 16 months, supported by their legal team headed up by Nick Roome.”
Andrew Cope and Paul Parkinson.

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Bernie Waldron NexusCORPORATE vehicle rental provider Nexus has appointed Bernie Waldron, a former senior international executive with IBM, as chairman to support the business through the next stage of its growth.

Mr Waldron arrives with 30 years of global technology experience, spanning start-ups, venture capital, private equity and public companies. He oversaw the acquisition of Maersk Data Group, which formed the basis for a new IBM global transportation business, and where, as executive chairman, he was responsible for 30 companies and 3,500 employees across 12 countries.

He has also held non-executive positions with a number of companies including cloud-based service providers Node4 and APSU, advanced process modelling company PSE, Financial Services information provider Kneip and social media aggregator Amondo.

Founded in 1999, Leeds-based Nexus has access to over 500,000 rental vehicles in over 2,000 locations across the UK through its intelligent booking and rental management system, IRIS.

Bowmark Capital, the private equity investment firm, acquired a majority shareholding in Nexus in December 2015.

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Katherine Denby N8 ResearchTHE N8 Research Partnership (N8) has announced the appointment of Professor Katherine Denby as academic director and Jonathan Oxley as operations and business development director.

The appointments mark the coming together of the N8 AgriFood operations team based at the University of York, where Prof Denby and Mr Oxley will work together to promote collaboration across the N8 Universities in the AgriFood arena, encouraging new collaboration between research groups from different disciplines and enhancing engagement with the private sector along the AgriFood supply chain ‘from farm to fork’.

The N8 Research Partnership is the collaboration body for the universities of Durham, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield, and York. AgriFood is one of N8’s main areas of focus. N8 aims to maximise the impact of their member universities’ world-class research base to enable business innovation and societal transformation.

Prof Denby said: “The breadth and depth of AgriFood research across the N8Jonathan Oxley N8 Research partnership means we can bring different research skills and expertise together to achieve new outcomes.
 
“The N8 partnership is a real step-change in how universities work together, greatly expanding what a single university can achieve. Pooling resources, including multiple university farms, as well as complementary expertise gives us a competitive research base that can meet the varied challenges of sustainable, resilient and healthy food supply.

“The N8 AgriFood programme provides a single forum for industry to access academic research across these eight northern universities, and with a team of Knowledge Exchange fellows will drive the formation of productive partnerships across the public and private sector.”

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