Efficiency Improvements & Margin Development. (Tel Aviv and Kyriat Gat, Israel)

(16 months)

• Sugat is wholly owned by E.D.& F. Man, making & marketing sugar, plus a full food range. Engaged to make manufacturing efficiently to quality whilst building margins. Set up & ran operating efficiency strategy, negotiated new power/steam/CO 2 plant, built world class business processes. Energy supply savings of c.$7-10M/yr , stabilised factory output quality with 55% volume uplift. Made cost savings of $5.35M/yr , plus $1.5M CAPEX with <1 year return

Turnaround & Company Sale

(16 months)

• TGI was the privatised Romanian tyre industry, with an International investment bank as backer. Engaged to recover the 6000 employees, $0.5BN fixed assets business & sell same. Devised a cash generation plan based on hard currency sales, recovering a $30M BS 'hole', built a dynamic young local management team & improving operating quality & efficiency. Workforce reduced 15%, exports lifted to 15% of sales, company sold in 3 parts, & BS 'hole' filled by $20M.

Build GM, fix IR, Market & JV Issues

(8 months)

• KNDL is owned by Swiss parent, Kuehne & Nagel a large international logistics company. Engaged to return to profitable growth after multi-year market & margin deterioration. Built & ran a full business strategy, re-structured the mgt. team & ran transformation programme. Increased Sales 15%, cost savings of £15.6M/yr, >99.25%‘OTIF’, £80M contract pipeline.

Profit Improvement Programme

(13 months)

• ES was a JV group, owned by Tate & Lyle PLC & St. Louis Sucre (owned by Sudzucker AG). Engaged to bring activity to international levels with sales & costs under control in each market. Reviewed, set up & implemented country business plans; strengthened the senior management team & dealt with bad practice. Gained a €12M equity injection, €36M new bank facilities & €13M old debt settled for €3M. Slovak ops 21% RONA, Hungary 9% RONA, Czech to b/even. Took Czech government to international tribunal & won ( €100M claim).

Regulated Market & Supply Chain Start-up.

(15 months)

• USC is wholly owned by E.D.& F. Man, making & marketing sugar & its bi-products. Engaged to deliver a $30M start-up, secure quota for home market & establish the beet supply chain. Devised & ran the business strategy, built the mgt. team, commissioned & ran the 1st ‘campaign’. Commissioned in 4weeks a best in class factory for $30M, delivered first monthly +ve cash flows, obtained national ‘A’ quota, grew beet at 157%of national average sugar content, identified energy cost savings of 15%,sold $10M + sugar in first season at +2%over the market.

Market Development & Operations Effectiveness

(6 months)

• Debreceni was a PE backed Hungarian pork-based meat processor supplying major retailers. Engaged to achieve high quality standards & output, serving a broader market profitably. Set up & ran integrated business strategy focussed on cash & wc control, operations & supply chain overhaul, plus market development initiative. Achieved €2.25M stock reduction, cash cliff moved to next year, €0.25M/mth cost savings, +€2.23M NSV & positive Tesco audit.

Re-build Profitable Growth

(6 months)

• Lex was a profitable division of RAC PLC but suffering several adverse changes. Engaged to manage back to forecast profit, re-build new bus. dev., hand back in-house a major a/c & move the main site without interruptions. Set about running to world class operational quality/cost, re-vamping NBD & project managing the site move plus major account re-patriation. Added £23.5M margin in year 1, £13.5M bonus for a/c re-patriation, ran £20M site move, reduced h/c 19%.

Soft-landing Administration

(2 + 12 months)

• Innovate was a wholly owned subsidiary of an OMX quoted Top 30 multinational. Engaged to achieve a soft-landing administration via sale of all UK business & best creditor value possible. Managed daily cash flow, banking relationships, all senior client contacts, legal & corporate advisors, plus operations team activities. Group sold in 4 parts for £103M. 100% recovery to secured & preferred creditors, 1950 jobs out of 2000 TUPE'd across. All a/cs fully serviced.

Profit Improvement & Prep for Sale

(12 months)

• LSUK was a PE owned 56 branch UK network supplying vehicle parts & services. Engaged to improve profitability & prep for sale. Set up & ran a wc control & margin increase plan plus cash release & monitoring regime. Re-invested £1.6M cash to re-focus the business. In the period, GM rose 23.3%, Sales/head +21.7%, PBIT +£1.77M , Net Worth +£4M , NBD pipeline +£7M .

Avoiding Insolvency

(3 months)

• AFC was AIM listed with depleted margins due to sky-high copper prices. Engaged to improve cash flow & avoid insolvency. Set up & ran cash burn reduction plan, bank communications & alternative funding search. White knight PE firm found who bought the co. Set up £3M stock reduction programme. All creditors secured at 100% post deal (soft landing administration). Shareholders offered cash or Newco shares.

An £80m sales business bought by the privately owned “Apeejay Surrendra Group” of India from Premier Foods plc.

At a purchase price of c.£85m, this was the 6th largest foreign investment in Indian corporate history.

As Interim Chief Executive Officer I provided immediate pre & post acquisition leadership to establish the independent business.

Site Integration & Profitable Growth

(6 months)

• CWW steel processing was part of a VC backed group & had been making losses. Engaged to achieve profitable growth & integrate the business including capital items from a closing sister site. Planned & delivered the site integration & improved product margins through SP & cost control. Achieved +ve 1st half OP (prior year loss £2.75M). +33% in productivity achieved; +7% SP home market key product uplift. Euro exports SP increased to give full overhead recovery.

Margin Recovery and Restructuring

(4 months)

• Rydal Hall plus 34 acre estate is wholly owned by the Diocese of Carlisle. Engaged to enable profitable, sustainable operation of Christian mission through service. Re-focussed the team with strategic business development implementation, consistent with culture & mission. Built a stronger mgt. team, initiated fit-for-purpose processes, made tailored SP increases across all 6 LoBs, core contract renegotiations adding 3% to GM, managed 50% staff change in 5 weeks.

Transformation to Profitable Growth

(22 months)

• CQR was a loss-making division of a quoted defence & security group. Engaged to return the business to profit, create & implement a long term growth strategy. Re-structured the business into 4 profit centres, rapidly recovering operational & commercial control. Produced the strategy & implemented, with an expansive capital programme. In 2 years, went from losses to 7.6% ROS & 26.4% RONA, having acquired & integrated 3 tech businesses. Grew sales 2.7x in 2 years.

Profit Improvement & Cash Generation

(6 months)

• Turbo Systems, capital equipment producer, had to improve profit to support the heavily indebted quoted parent group. Engaged to deliver this in short order. Financial controls were aligned to group turnaround needs, a strategy developed & implemented, restructuring into 3 work streams including e-commerce & 15 change management projects. Sales rose via market diversification by 25% at c.40% higher margin. Reduced operating costs giving +300% OP versus budget.

• SPPL was suffering from rapid RM price increases, SKU control & SP compression. Engaged to bring profitable growth, BS & workflow control for the owners. Brought in technical & management expertise to improve workflows, rationalise SKUs, secure key RM supply & expand customer base at increased margins. Reduced SKU numbers 30%, increased exports from 10 to 20% of sales, reduced RM costs 6%, lifted stock turns to 26 & reduced Ops costs by £0.6M/yr.