Our team
Ian Laing
Chairman
Ian Laing has had an entrepreneurial career in commercial property and early stage science and technology companies.
He worked for English Property Corporation plc for 13 years, initially as general manager of overseas operations in Australia, Brussels and Paris and subsequently as a main board director with responsibility for the Group’s overseas properties, the UK industrial portfolio and trading subsidiaries.
In 1984 Ian Laing and his business partner, Nick Cross, completed a management buy-out of Lansdown Estates Group Ltd, which owned the Milton Park Estate in Oxfordshire. Mr Laing was managing director until 1993 and then chairman of Milton Park until 2006. During this period the site was transformed from a former Ordnance Depot into one of Europe’s leading mixed-use business parks, with a growing concentration of science and technology-based businesses.
Together with Nick Cross, Ian Laing has been a founding shareholder and non-executive director of a series of new high-tech businesses, including Oxford Asymmetry International plc (chiral and combinatorial chemistry – resigned 2000), Oxford Semiconductor Ltd (semiconductor design- resigned 2005), Oxagen Ltd (genomics – resigned 2001) and Doctors.net.uk Ltd (internet provider for the medical profession). He has also supported other Oxfordshire science and technology-based businesses, and is a non-executive director of Sussex Place Ventures Ltd and Bamboo Investments plc, both of which specialise in seedcorn funding of early-stage companies.
Ian Laing is also a shareholder and non-executive director of Stanhope plc, which creates major commercial and mixed-use developments in London and the south-east.
Ian Laing was a non-executive director of the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust between 1993 and 1998 and a Governor and Deputy Chairman of London Business School between 1996 and 2005. He is currently a Governor of the Royal Shakespeare Company and an Honorary Fellow of Green College and St Edmund Hall, Oxford.
Sir Michael Lyons
Following a distinguished career in Local Government, Sir Michael Lyons now acts as strategic adviser to Government and a range of organisations in both the public and private sectors.
Sir Michael Lyons completed a high profile review on the future of local government and finance structures, published in Spring 2007, and was previously responsible for the 2004 Lyons Review of Public Sector relocation for the Treasury.
Sir Michael was appointed as Chairman of the BBC Trust in April 2007 and is a former Chief Executive of Birmingham City Council, Nottinghamshire County Council and Wolverhampton Borough Council. He is also Chairman of the English Cities Fund, which aims to bring together the public and private sector to promote sustainable urban regeneration, and a non-executive director of Mouchel Parkman plc, a growing support services company, and of Wragge & Co, solicitors. He was formerly Acting Chairman of the Audit Commission and Professor of Public Policy at Birmingham University. Sir Michael is Chairman of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and a Governor of the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Roger Quince
Roger Quince combines experience at board level in industry and property investment with consultancy in the field of public policy.
Roger Quince is a co-founder of SQW and was formerly Managing Director of SQW Consulting. As well as leading the development of the firm to become one of the foremost in its field he directed many of SQW’s flagship projects, principally in the science and technology field. His consultancy experience includes a strong international dimension, with assignments spanning Asia Pacific, Latin America, Africa, the Mediterranean, and several countries in both Western and Eastern Europe.
Mr Quince is currently an executive director of MEPC Ltd, one of the UK’s leading property companies with responsibility for three business parks with a combined value in excess of £450 million and more than 300 tenant businesses. These include Granta Park near Cambridge which is dedicated to the biotechnology sector and which he established from scratch.
Roger Quince is also Vice Chair of Linton Village College, a successful state secondary school in Cambridgeshire, and chairs the Cambridge Music Festival, a triennial classical music festival which comprises over 70 separate events.
Sir William Wells
Sir William Wells’ career encompasses senior positions in public health, commercial property, insurance and small business.
Sir William Wells is the Chairman of the Department of Health’s Commercial Advisory Board, which advises ministers on the effects of policy on the private sector, and was previously the Chairman of the NHS Appointments Commission, which he established in 2001. Sir William is also a former Governor of the Royal Free Hospital, London, and Regional Chairman of the South Thames Region.
Sir William was Managing Partner and then Chairman of Chesterton chartered surveyors for 34 years, where he oversaw their transition from a private partnership to a listed company. His other former experience includes non-executive director roles with AMP (UK) which acquired the Pearl Group, London Life, NPI and Henderson. He guided AMP (UK) through a disposal programme leading to the refloating of Henderson Group plc and of Exel plc, which was subsequently acquired by Deutsche Post.
Sir William is Chairman of ADL, an AIM-listed care home provider and of CMG plc, a specialist in the care of adults and children with learning difficulties, and a director of Urban Village, which is developing a mixed use ‘village’ in Shoreditch to provide homes, support and training for over 300 homeless people.
Chris Green
Group Chief Executive Officer
Chris Green has been Chief Executive Officer of SQW Group since June 2006, and was previously Managing Director of SQW Consulting for eight years. He led a Management Buy-Out of SQW in 2004 and negotiated the 2006 merger with Oxford Innovation, which brought OI into the SQW Group.
Chris has 28 years experience of economic development work in the public and private sectors, including 18 years consultancy experience with SQW. He has directed a range of projects throughout the UK and internationally on technology-based development, urban and regional regeneration, education/industry links, business growth, tourism and institutional development.
Chris has also led work on proposals for the re-use of major employment sites and on inward investment. His international work has included projects on small business and technology development, and organisational re-structuring, in countries as diverse as Bangladesh, Hong Kong/China, Croatia, Denmark, Indonesia, Malawi, Mauritius and Pakistan.
Prior to joining SQW in 1987, Chris had approximately 10 years experience of work in local government and economic development, primarily in the UK.
Andrew Strivens
Group Chief Operating Officer
Andrew Strivens has overall responsibility for central support functions at SQW Group, with a particular focus on Finance and Human Resources.
Prior to joining SQW Group, he was Chief Operating Officer, Finance Director and Company Secretary at TMG, an IT-based professional services firm.
Andrew was also formerly Chief Operating Officer at the London office of Weil Gotshal & Manges, a New York based city law firm, ranked 12th globally, where he led a turnaround of the office’s financial performance and substantially improved the HR services.
Andrew trained as an accountant at Coopers & Lybrand and subsequently worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers as a management consultant.
