Latest Appointments: Liquid Accounts, Poundworld, Irwin Mitchell, RSM Tenon
COLIN Meakin has been appointed as chief executive of Liquid Accounts, the developer of on-line cloud accounting software for the SME market.
Mr Meakin said: “There is great potential for us to expand rapidly in the SME sector where we specialise and of which there are 4.5m companies in the UK. We believe our accounting solution is one of the most comprehensive and cost effective available and we plan to triple our user base from the existing 1,600 companies over the next two years creating more than 20 new jobs.”
Mr Meakin joins from Concorde Excel Holdings where he led the consortium that raised £1.8m for the company’s acquisition.
In four years he helped to turn the loss-making company, including the acquisition of four more businesses, into a profitable organisation, developing the merged entity into the £10m Concorde IT Group.
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DISCOUNT retailer Poundworld has appointed Phil Screeton as chief financial officer.
Mr Screeton joins Poundworld from the Leeds-based private equity backed Lowell Group, where he has been CFO for the past seven years.
He previously held a number of senior finance roles within GE Capital bank and the Kingfisher group of companies.
Poundworld’s founder and chief executive Chris Edwards said: “I am delighted to welcome Phil to the board and look forward to working with him. We have achieved tremendous growth over the past few years with turnover to March 2012 being £206.5m.
“Building on this continued growth and our store opening plan turnover this year will be in excess of £300m with a projected EBITDA figure of £11m.”
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LAW firm Irwin Mitchell has boosted its public law team in Sheffield.
Environmental and planning solicitor Dr Justin Neal and solicitor Michael Robinson, who will be taking on environmental and healthcare briefs, have both joined.
Dr Neal, a former lecturer, specialises in environmental law and planning/local government litigation. Before coming to Irwin Mitchell he headed the team at Fish Legal for six years.
Mr Robinson will deal with regulatory disputes, particularly for professionals. He has worked for the Crown Prosecution Service and in an in-house regulatory role for the Environment Agency.
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DAVID Firth has joined RSM Tenon as a financial management consultant.
Mr Firth joins the financial management team from Yorkshire Bank in Sheffield where he worked as an independent financial advisor for five years.
Vinodh Josh, head of financial management, northern region, said: “We are delighted to welcome David, he is an experienced and fully qualified IFA, having worked in financial services for 20 years.”
