Birmingham and Solihull LEP board unveiled

THE eight business leaders who will run the Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership have been unveiled.

Among the board members are KPMG’s Midlands chairman Steve Hollis, who will be LEP deputy chairman, and Paul Heaven, manager of Birmingham-based Blue Sky Corporate Finance.

Manufacturing is strongly represented with senior executives from Cadbury, Jaguar Land Rover, ThyssenKrupp and Wade Lyn from Cleone Foods, who is also a West Midlands business ambassador for the Prince of Wales.

The board, which has no women on it, will report to new chairman Andy Street, the managing director of John Lewis who was formally announced in the post two weeks ago.

The LEP said there were over 80 applications for the roles and the selection procedure ensured “the right mix of people” to reflect “not just the geography of the region, but also the key sectors and different size of businesses”.

The LEP, one of several replacing Advantage West Midlands which closes next year, covers nine local authority areas: Cannock, East Staffordshire, Lichfield, Tamworth, Bromsgrove, Redditch and Wyre Forest alongside Birmingham and Solihull.

The eight new members are:

Steve Hollis, Midlands chairman of KPMG
Rob Brown, group managing director of Roger Bullivant
Nick Bunker, president of Kraft Foods and Cadbury UK/Ireland
Brian Francis, European group chairman of ThyssenKrupp
Paul Heaven, owner/manager of Blue Sky Corporate Finance
David Kaye, managing director of National Express
Wade Lyn, managing director of Cleone Foods
Alan Volkaerts, director of Jaguar Land Rover’s Solihull plant

In addition Professor David Eastwood, vice-chancellor of University of Birmingham, has agreed to be the university and colleges representative on the board.