Adam Smith Institute

Tim Ambler is a Senior Fellow at London Business School.  His research covers dynamic marketing capabilities, advertising and the evaluation of marketing plans and performance.  He also works on regulation and deregulation in the UK and EU and narrative disclosures in company annual reports. He has written numerous books and monographs, and has published in the leading market journals. A member of the Journal of Marketing, International Journal of Advertising and Psychology & Marketing Editorial Review Boards, he is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and was previously Joint Managing Director of International Distillers and Vintners, now part of Diageo plc.  During his various marketing roles in IDV he was involved in the launch of Baileys, Malibu and Archers and the development of Smirnoff vodka worldwide.

Eric is a Chartered Accountant, with a strong City reputation. He is now Managing Partner of his own Chartered Accountancy Practice , Anstee Associates. He was, between 2003 until the end of 2006, the Chief Executive of The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.  Prior to that he was CEO of Old Mutual Financial Services plc.  He has been CFO of three FTSE 100 Companies – Old Mutual plc, The Energy Group plc and Eastern Electricity plc.  He is  currently a  non-executive Director of  The Financial Reporting Council and Insight Investments Limited, the asset management wing of HBOS plc, and  a member of the Takeover Panel Appeals Board.  His early career was as a Partner at Ernst & Young until 1993.

David Foxman runs his own communications consultancy with a number of clients in financial services including a stockbroker, a US property fund and an international corporate advisory business.  He is currently implementing a financial intermediary readership survey in conjunction with a media buying agency, and working with a corporate finance business to identify and evaluate potential acquisitions with the intention of establishing an AIM-listed financial communications group. From 1996 to 2007 he was Finance Director of Tavistock Communications, a leading independent financial public relations consultancy.  Before working in financial PR David ran the advertising division of a sales promotion consultancy which was ultimately sold to a quoted advertising group. He holds an MBA and is a graduate of Cambridge University in Modern and Medieval Languages.
 

Michael was for many years a broadcaster with ITN’s News at Ten, serving as a correspondent specialising in industrial, employment and consumer affairs. Having also worked as a print journalist for leading national newspapers, he gained valuable experience as the Director of Public Relations for British Coal. As the Director of Corporate Communications, he  developed the UK corporate environmental and social responsibility programme for French multi-utility Veolia. He is Director of Devon-based Green Fox Communications, which works with organisations to develop and protect their reputation, formulate strategies and engage with stakeholders and opinion-formers to secure understanding and support.

Richard has worked as a professional macro-economist and market strategist in the City of London since 1981. In 2006, he joined Ingenious Media, where he helped to establish a media-focused securities business. Between 2002 and 2006, he was employed by Bridgewell Group, where he set up and ran the research team. Between 1992 and 2002 he worked for Charterhouse Securities as head of research and for Charterhouse Group as chief economist. Prior to this, he was employed by Hoare Govett Ltd, ultimately heading up the economics and strategy team. Richard has been involved with several think tanks and has also been a member of the Council of Economic Advisers to the Conservative Party. He is a frequent broadcaster on radio and television and has written for various newspapers and magazines, including a weekly column in The Business.

Oliver Kinne was educated at the University of Bayreuth, where he studied business management. He was born and grew up in Germany. His wide ranging experience in manufacturing and telecommunications includes marketing roles at Kodak AG in Stuttgart, Nokia AG in Dusseldorf and his current role as Nokia’s Global Account Director for Vodafone, based in Farnborough, Hampshire. He travels extensively worldwide, particularly in such fast growing economies as India. Oliver has a keen interest in regulatory issues in both a UK and European context. Telecommunications service providers must address regulatory issues in each of the national markets within which they operate and regulation has proved to play a pivotal role in influencing investment decisions, the creation of new infrastructure technology – notably broadband, and the removal of barriers to competition and new entry.
 

Hugh is a lawyer specialising in the regulation of international aviation. He served as a partner and Head of Aviation Regulatory and Commercial of two large international law firms in the City before transferring to the commercial bar in 2004. Hugh spent six years’ on the Council of the Airport Operators Association, and was recently a member of a group which undertook a study for the European Commission on the impact of the introduction of secondary trading of airport slots. He also advised on the legal aspects of establishing a single air traffic management system in the EU. Hugh regularly speaks on aviation regulatory topics and is the joint author and contributing editor of the Aviation volume of Halsbury’s Laws.

Ed Robinson is a lawyer who was until May 2008 a Managing Director and Joint Head of European Loan Syndicate at Dresdner Kleinwort Limited in London. Prior to joining Dresdner Kleinwort in 1999, Ed was a Vice President at Citibank International, London, which he joined in 1990. Before becoming a banker, Ed was a banking lawyer in private practice in New York and London, representing corporations, investment banks and commercial banks in a wide variety of financial transactions. Ed is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor, Michigan (J.D. degree in 1979) and Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire (A.B. in Economics 1976).
 

Simon Walker is Chief Executive of the BVCA – The British Private Equity & Venture Capital Association. Between 2003 and 2007 he worked at Reuters, first as director of corporate communications, then as director of corporate communications and marketing. Before joining Reuters, he was communications secretary to HM The Queen at Buckingham Palace. He was previously director of corporate affairs at British Airways and a non-executive director of Comair Ltd (South Africa). Simon was a special adviser in the prime minister’s Policy Unit at 10 Downing Street (1996-97) and was previously a partner at Brunswick, the public relations group, and director of European public affairs for Hill & Knowlton in Brussels. He was also a member of the Better Regulation Commission.

Mike Waterson is currently Chairman of the Information Sciences Group, which includes the World Advertising Research Centre (WARC) among its interests. Until recently, Mike was also Chairman of NTC Economic & Financial Publishing. He is the originator of the world’s first entirely globally compatible set of private sector economic indicators, used by central, banks, commercial and investment banks worldwide. Previously, he was Group Economic Advisor to Guinness plc and the youngest partner at a consultancy company which later metamorphosed into PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC).

John Wilden MRCP FRCS is a leading neuro surgeon based in Harley Street.  He has worked as a neuro surgeon at several of the world’s leading medical centres including the  Mayo Clinic in the USA; the  Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford;  the Institute of Neurology and Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London, as well as the Maudsley Neurosurgical Unit in London. He taught Anatomy at the Anatomy School in Cambridge and tutored medical students at Cambridge colleges before training in general surgery and gaining the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgery, London. He has contributed to a number of professional committees, including the EORTC Brain Tumour Group. His current interest has broadened to develop an organisation to create strategies of healthcare based on the assumption that most common diseases will be curable by 2050.