People on the move: Hotfoot Design; Patrick Parsons; Social Communications; Fieldfisher

Joanna Young

Hotfoot Design, the design agency based in Lancaster, has appointed Joanna Young as a marketing strategist.

Young has many years of strategic marketing experience having previously worked at Fat Media; as executive director at a major arts centre in Colorado, at the Royal Automobile Club on Pall Mall, and as a consultant to membership organisations including the Institute of Directors.

Guy Cookson, partner at Hotfoot Design, said “We’re thrilled to have Joanna on board as she brings so much expertise, experience and enthusiasm. We are all about helping great companies grow, and Joanna is full of ideas about how to define and communicate what makes our clients special. It’s a really exciting time for Hotfoot, and so it’s great that Joanna is now part of our team.”

Young will be working with Hotfoot to ensure that the agency’s design is accompanied by strategic, practical marketing advice, to help clients make the most of the branding, digital and marketing services delivered by the agency. Hotfoot also recently appointed the chair of Lancaster Digital, Michael Gibson, as a non-executive director.

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Multidisciplinary consulting engineering company Patrick Parsons have strengthened its management team with the appointment of Owen Stevens, who joins the rapidly growing firm as regional geoenvironmental director for the North West and Yorkshire.

Stevens, who has more than 20 years’ experience in the industry, will be covering service offerings from the firm’s existing Manchester, Huddersfield and Chester offices. He brings with him a wealth of knowledge in geotechnics, contaminated land, coal mining legacy issues, remediation, geophysics, ground investigations and risk assessments.

He said: “It’s a really exciting time to be joining Patrick Parsons, with the company continuing to grow and excel in the industry.
“With so many services to offer, I could see that joining Patrick Parsons would help me provide innovative solutions for our clients, all under one roof.”

Dr Grant Richardson, director of environment & energy at Patrick Parsons, said: “Owen will be instrumental in developing relationships with our existing clients and forging new partnerships. He will be taking a strategic view of the geoenvironmental service offering and its integration in the wider engineering services available to our clients.

“We are very excited that Owen has chosen to invest the next big phase of his career with Patrick Parsons.”
Patrick Parsons are a consultancy with eight UK, and two international offices. The firm has more than 200 specialist engineers and provides design services across civil, structural, geoenvironmental, infrastructure and M&E disciplines.

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Andrew Cumpsty, one of Britain’s best respected public affairs and communications practitioners and the former leader of Reading Borough Council has joined Social Communications as senior counsel.

Cumpsty, who founded The Enterprise Forum in 1997 and has been its chairman for 16 years, has an exceptional track record in foreign trade and investment having signed a trade concordat between the UK and Hungary and helping to forge new trade links for Britain with China, Eastern Europe and Malaysia.

For more than 20 years he has led in improving business involvement in UK and European policy development. A freeman of the City of Lancaster, Cumpsty has held a number of prominent roles in the North of England including chairman of the Manchester Employers Network and is also the co-founder and former deputy chairman of the Thames Valley Berkshire Local Enterprise Partnership.

Cumpsty said: “Social Communications has the perfect communications mix for the new reality of the UK economy and a strong team nationwide. In joining the team, I look forward to helping existing clients, supporting the Social Communications team in their development and assisting in their continued growth and success.”

John Quinton-Barber, managing director of Social Communications, said: “Social Communications is passionate about giving our clients access to the best insight and counsel. The appointment of Andrew is a testament to this.

“For more than 20 years Andrew has been at the heart of improving communications between business and policy makers. As a result Andrew has a tremendous insight into Westminster helping us to provide expert public affairs support for our clients as well as his understanding in overseas markets such as China, Malaysia and Eastern Europe.”

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European law firm Fieldfisher has announced two further partner hires, Liam Buckley, real estate partner from Clyde & Co and Simon Taylor from commercial law firm Brabners.

Buckley is one of the North West’s most well-known property development lawyers and was head of real estate at Squire Patton Boggs (formerly Hammonds) and at the Manchester office of Clyde & Co. His practice covers commercial property development and investment projects, also including regeneration work.

He acted for the shareholders of Iceland Frozen Food Group on the £1.6bn disposal of the group in 2014, and has acted for Stobart Group on a series of industrial and development projects and for Prologis Developments Limited in relation to its industrial development projects in Daventry and Bradford.

Buckley has also acted on a series of major projects in Manchester including the sale of the Manchester Arndale Centre for P&O Shopping Centres Ltd; Allied London on Spinningfields and Co-operative Group Limited on the creation of the Noma business district. He is keen to work with other North West businesses and continue Fieldfisher’s work in the region and further afield.

Taylor is a lawyer in the sport and entertainment industry, with more than 30 years’ experience and a strong client base in the entertainment sector.

Buckley and Taylor are the third and fourth partners to be added to Fieldfisher’s growing team in the past three months, with David Bowcock, also from Brabners joining the corporate team and Krista Powell having joined the real estate team from Freeman Fisher.

Buckley said: “I’m excited to join Fieldfisher and its rapidly expanding real estate team. I feel my key objectives are aligned with the firm’s, and we both are keen to focus on continuing to grow our North West network and more generally, our UK presence.”

Ian Austin, managing partner Manchester and head of commercial litigation, said: “These are our third and fourth new partner hires in a matter of months, and our recruitment drive is showing no signs of slowing down as 2018 approaches.”

Fieldfisher’s Manchester office specialises in dispute resolution, real estate, real estate finance, corporate, technology, regulatory, employment, intellectual property and insolvency, working for regional and international clients.

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