Paragon will reveal the new CEO for UKI & Lux today, replacing Jeremy Walters who has expanded his role to include responsibility for Belgium/Netherlands; the DACH countries and Czech Republic; Western Europe as well as UKI & Lux.
The new CEO is Jim Hartshorne who has joined the company from DHL Supply Chain where he has been managing director for four and a half years. He has worked for DHL for nine and a half years.
The appointment brings an executive from outside the communications industry, but with experience of running a £1 billion business. In the UK Paragon currently generates sales of £500 million from its seven business areas and where customer communications dominates.
Hartshorne says: “I’m incredibly proud to have joined Paragon at such a pivotal point in the business’ journey as it repositions itself in the market. I believe that Paragon’s full potential is still to be unlocked as it scales, and I hope to leverage the skills I’ve gained from my time in the B2B service sector to accelerate its growth trajectory.”
At the same time Dave Reynolds retains responsibility for customer communications, BPO and lead supply in the UK and Dave Phillips becomes COO for customer communications across the five UK production sites.
The move comes as the group draws breath on its rapid expansion in customer communications. When Walters joined the business five years ago with the acquisition of DST, turnover was £30 million. A series of acquisitions since has taken turnover to £500 million, but has left the company will limited opportunities for growth on this scale in the print focused areas.
Instead the growth will come from a mix of organic and acquisition to expand the other sectors it is engaged in. Paragon now operates across seven areas, consulting nd agency, lead supply, supply chain management, BPO, workplace solutions, print solutions as well as customer communications. There is growth potential in many of these sectors which Hartshorne will seek to unlock in various ways.
Growth in Identification is running at 20% thanks to growing opportunity and interest in RFID says Walters, so will continue on the organic path. Opportunities in BPO and workplace solutions are likely to come from acquisition, hence the decision to import an expert from outside print. “BPO is 11% of UK revenue now, so there is growth opportunity in the UK from that area. We believe there’s an opportunity to double that while it’s hard to double the size of the customer communication business, so we have to do things differently,” says Walters.
The growth agenda remains in place, both in the UK and across the wider area that he is now responsible for. For the UK there are further opportunities in developing what he describes as ‘embryonic lines’ within the B2B space. That calls for an outsider to lead the expansion.
“It is difficult to find someone with the growth pedigree we are looking for within our seven lines of business and with the experience of running a business of the size we want to be. We are bringing in someone with that experience.”
It will leave Walters with the challenge of replicating Paragon’s UK success in its other geographies and bringing these to the same size if possible. “Germany, for example, should be the same as the UK. It is about the same size as a population and should be a mirror of the UK, but right now is 40% of the UK’s size. But there are differences in culture, in regulations and in the competitor landscape, which means it may not look like the UK at the moment. Belgium and Netherlands already have far higher digitisation and acceptance of digitisation than Germany, the UK or France and are further along the path of e-activity and is a region where we see great potential for organic growth and we can bring that experience to the UK.”
Growth for Paragon can also come from geographic expansion, replicating the models that work in four regions currently into further geographies. Says Walters: “If we wanted to go to the US, we have a very clear model, but it’s also just as likely we could expand to another geography further to the east, something that’s a strong possibility over the next five years.
“The important thing is to make sure we have a very solid business for the future of our 8,000 employees.”
