Anthony Habgood

Sir Anthony John Habgood (born 8 November 1946)[1] is a British businessman. He has been chief executive of Bunzl and chairman of Whitbread, RELX Group and of the Court of the Bank of England. He has been described in the Financial Times as "the City's go-to grandee."[2]

Sir Anthony Habgood
Born	Anthony John Habgood 8 November 1946 Norfolk, England
Nationality	British
Education	Gresham's School
Alma mater	Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge Carnegie Mellon University
Occupation	Businessman
Years active	1970–present
Title	Chairman, RELX Group Chairman, Court of the Bank of England Chairman, Preqin Holding Limited
Board member of	RELX Group, Bank of England
Spouse(s)	Nancy Atkinson ​ (m. 1974)​
Children	3

Early life

Anthony John Habgood was born on 8 November 1946, the son of John Michael Habgood MC and his wife Margaret Diana Middleton, née Dalby.[3] He was educated at Gresham's School, Norfolk.[4][5] He has a bachelor's degree from Cambridge University (Gonville and Caius College), and a master's degree in industrial administration from Carnegie Mellon University.[3]

Career

He joined Boston Consulting Group in 1970 and became a director in 1977.[6]

From 1991 to 2005, Habgood was chief executive, then chairman of Bunzl, growing turnover from continuing operations from £500 million to £2.9 billion, and improving profits by a factor of 34, and "is widely credited with transforming Bunzl".[7]

Habgood was chairman of Whitbread plc from 2005 to 2014[8] and of Mölnlycke Health Care from 2006 to 2007 while it was owned by the private equity house APAX Partners. He has been chairman of RELX Group (formerly Reed Elsevier), a multinational information and analytics company, since June 2009.[9] He has been chairman of Preqin Holding Limited since November 2011.[10]

Past non-executive directorships include NatWest Bank plc,[11] Powergen plc[12] and Marks and Spencer plc[13]

He was senior non-executive director of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust from 2006 until March 2013, and was chair of Norwich Research Park between March 2013 and March 2016.[14][15]

In March 2014, Habgood was appointed chairman of the Court of the Bank of England.[16]

Habgood was appointed a Knight Bachelor in the 2018 New Year Honours for services to UK Industry.[17]

Views on strategy

Habgood has said that a key factor in strategy is determining which elements of a group portfolio have good growth characteristics, and focusing on these.[18]

Personal life

On 29 May 1974, Habgood married Nancy Atkinson, the daughter of Ray Nelson Atkinson of San Mateo, California, US.[3] They have three children, and split their time between Chelsea and Norfolk.[5][3]

References

1. "Agenda Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders 2009" (PDF). Reed Elsevier NV. 2009. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 December 2015. Retrieved 1 November 2012.
2. https://archive.is/20150506164312/http://m.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/c879d586-ae7d-11e3-8e41-00144feab7de.html. Archived from the original on 6 May 2015. Retrieved 6 September 2014. Missing or empty |title= (help)
3. Lucy Hume (5 October 2017). People of Today 2017. Debrett's. pp. 1925–26. ISBN 978-1-9997670-3-7. Retrieved 4 January 2018.
4. "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
5. "The Interview: A cool customer with a track record of giving a warm feeling to shareholders". The Independent. 30 April 2005. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
6. "Anthony Habgood profile". Oxford University. Archived from the original on 3 October 2012. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
7. "Interview with Anthony Habgood" (PDF). Journal of Strategy and Management. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
8. "The Times: Whitbread chairman Anthony Habgood leaves little room for improvement". The Times. Retrieved 17 June 2014.
9. "View from the Top: Anthony Habgood, Chairman, RELX Group". Financial Times. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
10. "Anthony Habgood to Chair Preqin". peHUB. Retrieved 18 March 2014.
11. "NatWest Board Changes". NatWest Press Release. Retrieved 6 March 2001.
12. "Powergen Annual Report 2000" (PDF). Powergen. Retrieved 2 March 2001.
13. (PDF) https://web.archive.org/web/20120920082720/http://vernimmen.com/ftp/M%26S_buyback_2004.pdf. Archived from the original (PDF) on 20 September 2012. Retrieved 23 September 2014. Missing or empty |title= (help)
14. "6 March 2013 - FTSE 100 company Chair appointed to Norwich Research Park - BBSRC". bbsrc.ac.uk. Retrieved 26 July 2014.
15. "UEA Vice Chancellor Appointed Chair of Norwich Research Park". norwichresearchpark.com. Archived from the original on 20 June 2016. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
16. "Three senior appointments to the Bank of England" (PDF) (Press release). Bank of England. 18 March 2014. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
17. "No. 62150". The London Gazette (Supplement). 30 December 2017. p. N2.
18. "“We focused Relx on information and analytics, away from print magazines and all sorts of other stuff,” he said. “You have got to know enough to know that you want to do that — which in a business like this is not a walk in the park.” He recalled his time at Whitbread, which he chaired from 2005 until 2014. It comprised pub and high street restaurants, hotels and fitness clubs. “So we focused on Premier Inn and Costa Coffee. If you can profitably grow Premier Inn at 14% or 15% a year, you can create a massive amount of value. “That’s what I mean by strategy — as opposed to what the City tends to mean by strategy, which is buying and selling things and giving fees to people.” Times interview, 3/19, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ned-award-for-ftse-100-sir-anthony-habgood-fwhc5wrfm

External links

• 2010 BBC "The Bottom Line" video interview