Our Board
SSP has brought together a Board of Directors who are highly experienced within the travel food and beverage market and the broader retail industry.
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Vagn Sørensen
Chairman
Vagn is a Senior Industrial Advisor with EQT Partners and joined the SSP board as Chairman in June 2006. He is currently Chairman of Air Canada as well as a non-executive director of Royal Caribbean Cruises Limited. In addition, Vagn is a consultant Senior Adviser to Morgan Stanley in the Nordic region.
He was previously the President and Chief Executive Officer of Austrian Airlines Group from 2001 to 2006 and held various senior commercial positions and served as Deputy Chief Executive Officer with SAS Scandinavian Airlines System. Vagn has served as the Chairman of the Association of European Airlines and as a member of the Board of Governors of the International Air Transport Association as well as a non-executive director of Lufthansa Cargo AG.He holds a Master of Economics from Aarhus Business School in Denmark.
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Kate Swann
Chief Executive Officer - SSP Group
Kate joined SSP as Chief Executive Officer in September 2013.
Kate began her retail career with Tesco plc before working with some of the UK’s best-known companies, including Homepride Foods, Coca-Cola Schweppes and Dixons Retail plc. She then joined Homebase (part of the Home Retail Group), ultimately in the role of managing director, and in 2000 was made managing director of Argos. Kate joined WH Smith PLC as Chief Executive Officer in 2003. She was ranked number 21 in the Financial Times’ ‘Europe’s Top 25 Women in Business’ in 2006, and in the same year Fortune listed her as one of the 50 most powerful women in business. In 2012 she received both the Daily Telegraph award for Business Leader of the Decade at the National Business Awards and the Institute for Turnaround Chairman’s Special Award for exceptional and extraordinary performance in the transformation of WH Smith.
Kate graduated from the University of Bradford in 1986 with a BSc in Business Management and received an honorary doctorate from the University in 2007.
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Jonathan Davies
Chief Financial Officer
Jonathan has been the Chief Financial Officer of SSP since its formation within Compass Group in 2004.
Jonathan began his career in the food industry in Unilever plc’s management development programme. In 1987 Jonathan joined OC&C, the strategic management consultancy, where he was part of its rapid growth from a start-up to a leading international consulting firm for eight years. From 1995 to 2004 Jonathan worked for Safeway PLC, where he was Finance Director on the Executive Board from 1999 to 2004.
He holds a degree in Chemistry from Oxford University and an MBA from INSEAD, France.
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Simon Smith
Chief Executive Officer - SSP UK & Ireland
Simon joined SSP as CEO of the UK and Ireland region in 2014. In addition to running the UK, his role has broadened internationally, and he has taken full responsibility for the integration and development of our JV in India, Travel Food Services, which has been our largest acquisition to date. Before joining SSP, Simon was at WH Smith for ten years, most recently as managing director of WHSmith’s travel division. During his tenure, the travel division expanded to more than 20 new international markets across Europe, India, the Middle East and Asia Pacific.
Simon has more than 20 years of experience in the retail and catering sectors, having begun his career at Fenwicks before moving to Allders Department Stores and then Safeway, where he worked in both commercial and marketing roles. He joined the travel division of WHSmith in 2004 and held the roles of trading director and chief operating officer before his promotion to managing director.
Simon holds a first class honours degree from Leeds University Business School.
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John Barton
Senior Independent Non Executive Director
John joined SSP as an independent non-executive director in April 2014.
John was appointed to the Board of easyJet as Chairman in May 2013. He is also Chairman of Next PLC and Catlin Group Limited (the international insurance underwriters). John has served as Chairman of Cable and Wireless Worldwide PLC, Brit Insurance Holdings plc and Wellington Underwriting PLC. He was previously Senior Independent Director of WHSmith PLC and Hammerson PLC. He was also the Chief Executive of insurance broker JIB Group PLC from 1984 to 1997. After JIB’s merger with Lloyd Thomson in 1997, he became Chairman of the combined group, Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group PLC, until 2001.
John is a qualified chartered accountant and received an MBA from Strathclyde University.
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Ian Dyson
Independent Non-Executive Director
Ian joined SSP as an independent non-executive director in April 2014.
Ian is currently also Senior Independent Director of Betfair Group plc and ASOS plc and non-executive director of Intercontinental Hotels Group plc and Punch Taverns plc. He was formerly Chief Executive Officer of Punch Taverns plc, Group Finance & Operations Director at Marks & Spencer plc and Finance Director of The Rank Group plc. Prior to this he was Group Financial Controller of Hilton Group plc. He joined Hilton from Le Meridien, a division of Forte Group plc, where he had been Finance Director. His early career was spent with Arthur Andersen, where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 1986 and was promoted to a Partner of the firm in 1994. Ian was a non-executive director of Misys plc until September 2005.
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Per Utnegaard
Independent Non-Executive Director
Per joined SSP as an independent non-executive director in July 2015.
Per also serves as a member of the Board’s Remuneration and Audit Committees of SSP Group Board. He has been Chairman of the Executive Board of Bilfinger SE with effect from 1 June 2015. His previous roles include President and CEO of Swissport International Ltd., Group Wholesale Director and a member of the Group Board at Alliance Unichem plc, Senior Vice President, Corporate Business Development at Danzas Holding Ltd. (a subsidiary of Deutsche Post AG), and various senior positions at TNT Post Group.
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Denis Hennequin
Independent Non-Executive Director
Denis joined the SSP board as a non-executive director in February 2014.
Denis began his career at The McDonald’s Corporation, becoming President of McDonald’s Europe in 2005 where he was responsible for 6,600 restaurants in 40 countries. He was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Accor S.A., the worldwide hotel group, until 2013. Denis is currently also a non-executive director of Eurostar International Limited and the John Lewis Partnership.
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Carolyn Bradley
Independent Non-Executive Director
Carolyn joined SSP as an independent non-executive director in October 2018.
Carolyn serves on the Remuneration, Nomination and Audit Committees of SSP’s Group Board. She is also a non-executive director of Legal and General Group plc, Majid Al Futtaim Retail LLC, Marston’s PLC (Senior Independent Director) and The Mentoring Foundation. Carolyn currently serves on the Remuneration, Nomination and Audit Committees of Marston’s PLC and the Remuneration and Nomination Committees of Legal and General Group plc. Carolyn spent over 25 years at Tesco, holding a number of roles including Chief Operating Officer for Tesco.com, Commercial Director for Tesco Stores and Tesco UK Marketing Director, before being appointed Group Brand Director in 2012. She is a trustee and Deputy Chairman of Cancer Research UK and a member of the Advisory Board of Cambridge Judge Business School.
Carolyn graduated from the University of Cambridge with an MA in English Literature.
