Colin Jones
Colin joined Centaur in September 2018 and became Chair in June 2019. Prior to June 2018, Colin was CFO of Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC (Euromoney), where he worked in leadership roles in the UK and US for 22 years. He is also an independent non-executive director, and audit committee chair, at M&C Saatchi Plc, and a non-executive director and trustee of City Lit, London’s leading adult education college, where he chairs the Finance & Commercial Committee. During his time at Euromoney, Colin was instrumental in its transformation from its traditional media roots to a global, B2B digital information services group. He also has extensive M&A expertise through Euromoney’s many successful transactions. Before joining Euromoney, Colin was a Director at Price Waterhouse Europe, where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant.
Chair of the Nomination Committee and Member of the Remuneration Committee.
Swagatam Mukerji
Swag joined Centaur in 2016, after creating significant shareholder value previously at several blue chip FMCG companies, including United Biscuits plc, Diageo plc and Virgin, where he operated as a value creator, trouble-shooter and change agent. At Biocompatibles International plc, he led the commercialisation and international growth of the company, whilst running the product licensing division, increasing the share price fourfold in a falling market. Since then, he has been a C-suite director of three private equity backed businesses in a variety of sectors with the common theme of increasing shareholder value through strategy refresh, transformation and revitalising corporate culture. He has also led a substantial number of M&A transactions and multi-lender refinancings. Swag qualified as a Chartered Accountant at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP and is a Warwick MBA.
Simon Longfield
Simon joined Centaur in November 2019. He spent the previous 10 years as CFO of BMI Research, a leading provider through its subscriptions model of macroeconomic, industry and financial market analysis, which was acquired by Fitch Group in 2014. During his time at BMI Research revenues more than doubled as the company expanded internationally with Simon’s support. Prior to this, Simon was CFO of Newfound, an AIM-listed property and leisure group. Simon began his career at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant and worked in London and Australia.
William Eccleshare
William joined Centaur in July 2016. William served as CEO of Clear Channel Outdoor (NYSE) - one of the world’s largest out-of-home media companies – from 2009 to 2021. He is Senior Independent Director of Britvic plc and Chair of The Design Council – a charity by Royal Charter and the UK Government’s strategic advisor on design. William served as a non-executive director of Hays plc from 2004 to 2014, and was a Partner and Leader of European Branding Practice at McKinsey & Co from 2000 to 2003. He has also served in international leadership roles at major advertising agencies, including as European Chairman and CEO of BBDO (Omnicom); European Chairman of Young and Rubicam (WPP Group); Global Strategic Planning Director of J. Walter Thompson Worldwide (WPP Group); and CEO of PPGH/JWT Amsterdam.
Member of the Audit, Remuneration and Nomination Committees.
Carol Hosey
Carol joined Centaur on 5 February 2020. Carol has extensive remuneration experience at executive and board level and has spent over 20 years in senior HR roles, latterly as the Group HR Director for Mace Ltd, the international consultancy and construction group and Mitie Group plc.
Chair of the Remuneration Committee and member of the Audit and Nomination Committees. She is also the Non-Executive Director sponsor of Centaur’s employee engagement committee known as DICE.
Leslie-Ann Reed
Leslie-Ann joined Centaur on 1 March 2020 and became Chair of Centaur’s Audit Committee on 31 March 2020. Leslie-Ann is an experienced non-executive director and chairs the audit committee at Learning Technologies Group plc. She is also chair of the audit committee and senior independent non-executive director of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. Leslie-Ann is a chartered accountant and her executive roles have included CFO of the B2B publisher Metal Bulletin plc and the online auctioneer Go Industry plc.
Chair of the Audit Committee and member of the Nomination and Remuneration Committees.
Richard Staveley
Richard joined Centaur in May 2022 as a non-independent non-executive director. He is a qualified accountant with over twenty years’ experience of equity investing and fund management, primarily in publicly quoted companies. He is the lead fund manager at Rockwood Strategic Plc, which holds 5.9% of Centaur, and an advisor to Harwood Capital LLP, which holds 23.8%. Since qualifying as a Chartered Accountant at PricewaterhouseCoopers, Richard has worked in a senior capacity and as fund manager at several successful fund management businesses. He was Head of UK Smaller Companies at Société Générale Asset Management, managed the UK Small Companies and UK Income Funds at River and Mercantile Asset Management, where he was a co-founder and Head of Research and was responsible for UK small company investments at Majedie Asset Management. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in politics from the University of Newcastle. His other non-executive directorship is Bonhill Plc.