Our Board Members and Executive Team
Meet our Board of Directors and Executive Team. The board is made up of both executive and non-executive members.
Board Members
Our board is collectively responsible for setting out the strategy and vision of Nucleus, shaping and instilling company values, culture and standards and ensuring the maintenance of sound systems of internal control and risk management. We believe the board has all the necessary attributes to effectively guide and challenge the executive team and to ensure that Nucleus’ obligations to its shareholders and wider stakeholders are understood and met.
Our board consists of a team of executive and non-executive directors working together and using their experience of UK financial services and platform businesses to drive Nucleus forward and achieve good outcomes for its customers. Full biographies for each director are available by clicking on the images below.
Gordon Wilson
Chair
Gordon chairs our board and brings over 30 years’ of broad sector experience to Nucleus. He was previously chair of Interactive Investor, one of the UK’s largest investment platforms, President and CEO of Travelport, one of the world’s leading travel commerce platforms, and non-executive director of William Hill. Gordon currently holds board level positions with Ambassador Cruise Lines, Virgin Experience Days and with corporate travel management company, BCD Holdings.
Richard Hoskins
Senior Independent Non-Executive Director
Richard chairs our audit committee and has extensive non-executive experience having served as a board member for Old Mutual, Aviva, AIG, Hastings and BGL Group. With a career spanning almost 40 years, Richard brings a proven CEO and CFO track record for multiple blue-chip organisations, and deep expertise in financial services – particularly in insurance services and asset management.
Clare Bousfield
Independent Non-Executive Director
Clare chairs the risk committee. She currently chairs Audit and Risk for IVC Evidensia, and also recently joined the board of BUPA Ltd.
In her executive career Clare was CEO for M&G retail and savings businesses and prior to that CFO with M&G plc, CFO with Aegon UK and also held a number of senior roles with Swiss Reinsurance. Clare is an Advisory Member at Fintech Growth Fund and Deputy President at the Association of British Insurers.
Cathryn Riley
Independent Non-Executive Director
Cathryn chairs the remuneration committee. She’s currently a board member at the Financial Services Compensation Scheme and Liberty Managing Agency. She spent 17 years with Aviva where, in her final role as Group Chief Operations Officer, she was responsible for IT, Business Change and Operational Shared Services. Prior to this she was Group Chief Information Officer. She has also held key executive roles at BUPA, PWC and British Airways.
Scot French
Independent Non-Executive Director
Scot is a Governing Partner of HPS and is the Portfolio Manager of the HPS Strategic Investment Partners Funds. Prior to joining HPS in 2007, he spent three years at Citigroup where he managed a portfolio of private mezzanine and private equity investments in North America, Europe and Latin America. Prior to joining Citigroup, he worked in the Investment Banking Division at Goldman Sachs and in Mergers & Acquisitions at Salomon Brothers Inc.
Roisin Conran
Independent Non-Executive Director
Roisin is a Managing Director at HPS Investment Partners. Prior to joining HPS in 2016, Roisin worked as an investment professional at BlueBay Asset Management in London as a private credit specialist. She holds a BSc in Economics and Finance from the Quinn School of Business at University College Dublin.
Jake Blair
Independent Non-Executive Director
Jake is a Managing Director at HPS Investment Partners. Prior to joining HPS in 2007, he worked as a Vice President in General Electric’s Commercial Finance Distressed Debt Group, where he invested in distressed leveraged loans and was involved in numerous workouts on behalf of GE Capital. In 2000, Jake founded CampInteractive, a New York based charity, where he served as Executive Director for four years.
Owen Wilson
Observer
Owen is a partner at Epiris LLP, having joined the firm in 2013. Prior to this, Owen spent four years in Palamon Capital Partners as Principal, 5 years at Candover as Investment Director, and 7 years advising private equity clients whilst at Bain & Co. Owen obtained a BA in Mathematics from the University of Cambridge, as well as an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Richard Rowney
Chief Executive Officer
Richard Rowney joined as our CEO in 2020. Prior to this he held several roles at LV over 13 years, including Managing Director of LV Life and Pensions and Group CEO of LV. He’s also a director of the Platforms Association, the trade body representing the £1tr platforms industry.
Richard started his career in 1992, undertaking various senior operational, risk and change roles across Barclays Corporate and Retail Banking, and holds an honours degree in Geography from Leeds University, an MBA from Henley Management College and a GMP from Harvard Business School.
Alan McDonald
Interim Chief Financial Officer
Alan McDonald is our interim CFO. Alan, began his career in FMCG in 1994, undertaking multiple roles in high tech manufacturing, publicly owned utilities prior to his career of more than two decades in Financial Services. He has extensive expertise in strategic planning, financial operations, and organisational transformation. Alan has built a proven track record of driving growth, collaborating with investors, private equity firms, and entrepreneurs through all stages of funding.
At Lyca Money, he led the launch of a regulated EMI and international remittance business. Alan has also successfully integrated financial strategies post-merger at abrdn plc and spearheaded groundbreaking transformations in the UK payments industry as CEO of the Cheque and Credit Clearing Company. Alan is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (FCMA, CGMA) and holds an honours degree in Accountancy with Economics from the University of Stirling.
Executive Team
Our executive leadership team is responsible for the day-to-day management of the business and implementing Nucleus’ strategy.
Richard Rowney
Chief Executive Officer
Richard Rowney joined as our CEO in 2020. Prior to this he held several roles at LV over 13 years, including Managing Director of LV Life and Pensions and Group CEO of LV. He’s also a director of the Platforms Association, the trade body representing the £1tr platforms industry.
Richard started his career in 1992, undertaking various senior operational, risk and change roles across Barclays Corporate and Retail Banking, and holds an honours degree in Geography from Leeds University, an MBA from Henley Management College and a GMP from Harvard Business School.
Mike Regan
Chief Commerical Officer
Mike is our CCO and brings experience in M&A, driving business transformation and developing high performing finance teams. Prior to joining Nucleus, Mike was CFO for UK digital insurer BGLi for three years. Prior to this, he spent almost ten years at the Royal Bank of Scotland, and as part of this held the role of Finance Director for RBS’s Private Banking Franchise, Coutts. A chartered accountant by profession, Mike has a breadth and depth of experience in the financial services sector, starting his career at PwC and later holding senior positions at financial giants UBS and HSBC and European commercial bank West LB.
Alan McDonald
Interim Chief Financial Officer
Alan McDonald is our interim CFO. Alan, began his career in FMCG in 1994, undertaking multiple roles in high tech manufacturing, publicly owned utilities prior to his career of more than two decades in Financial Services. He has extensive expertise in strategic planning, financial operations, and organisational transformation. Alan has built a proven track record of driving growth, collaborating with investors, private equity firms, and entrepreneurs through all stages of funding.
At Lyca Money, he led the launch of a regulated EMI and international remittance business. Alan has also successfully integrated financial strategies post-merger at abrdn plc and spearheaded groundbreaking transformations in the UK payments industry as CEO of the Cheque and Credit Clearing Company. Alan is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (FCMA, CGMA) and holds an honours degree in Accountancy with Economics from the University of Stirling.
Ross Allan
Chief Operating Officer (*Subject to regulatory approval)
Ross is our COO. Ross has an extensive career in IT and Operations, holding a number of leadership roles, including Chief Operating Officer at Curtis Banks and Platform Development Director at abrdn. Ross has significant experience of running large operational environments and complex Transformation and Integration programmes, including the acquisition of the Elevate platform by Standard Life. Earlier in his career Ross was a consultant with Accenture where he specialised in delivering technology change across a number of sectors.
*subject to regulatory approval
Jenny Thorpe
Chief Technology Officer
Jenny Thorpe is our CTO and has an impressive background in the development and delivery of platform IT strategies. Prior to this, Jenny was an Associate Director at Alpha FMC, delivering a range of initiatives for leading platforms and held various roles across transformation, IT strategy and architecture at Aegon and Alliance Trust. She is responsible for the leadership and development of our technological teams, including our internal systems and platforms.
Peter Docherty
Chief Transformation Officer
Peter is our Chief Transformation Officer. Peter has more than 20 years of experience in financial services and has extensive experience of delivering large-scale migrations of complex customer books to FNZ platforms, along with strong regulatory relationships and risk management thinking. Peter joined Curtis Banks in January 2023 and led the team to successfully navigate the sale of the business to Nucleus. He was previously CEO and Managing Director of Embark Platform, and before that, CEO and CRO of Alliance Trust Savings.
Richard Collins
Interim Chief Risk Officer (*Subject to regulatory approval)
Richard Collins is our Interim CRO. He has over 30 years’ risk leadership experience gained from a number of sectors within financial services including with Vanguard UK where he was the Head of Risk during the period where they launched their GIA and ISA with FNZ. Most recently he held SMF4 in the role of Group Chief Risk and Compliance officer for Connells/Countrywide. Prior to that he held senior roles across both 1st and 2nd Lines of Defence in Investment Banking, Asset Management, Investment and Wealth Management at Citi, UBS, Barclays, RBS, Vanguard and Macquarie.
Richard has a proven ability in enabling the achievement of full business potential through comprehensive risk management. He has a strong track record in leading readiness and remediation change and upskilling risk performance as well as driving the right risk culture within organisations.
Alison Longbottom
Chief People Officer
Alison is our CPO having joined James Hay in October 2020. Her career spans two decades, incorporating roles in the UK, Europe and Africa across FTSE 250 companies, Private Equity, B2B and B2G, and unionised manufacturing. Prior to joining James Hay she held a human resources leadership role at Portals, world-leading banknote and passport paper manufacturer, having supported the separation of the business from a public company and the establishment of a private equity-backed independent business.
Steve Knight
Chief Business Performance Officer
Steve Knight is our Chief Business Performance Officer. Steve joined James Hay as Operations Director in January 2021. With over 30 years’ experience leading operations and change across financial services, Steve is responsible for ensuring the business is aligned around delivering key results and ensures that delivering great outcomes for customers is at the heart of everything we do.
Prior to James Hay, Steve held both Group Transformation Director and COO roles during his thirteen years at LV. Before that he spent 20 years in financial services including five years with General Electric ending as Operations and Quality Director for GE Life.