Europa, Savills, Sirius Real Estate, Berenberg, CBRE, Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, John Laing, ilke Homes, YIT, LondonMetric Property, ATP Real Estate, Lendlease, Eku Energy, Sidley Austin

Sirius Real Estate – Chris Bowman has been appointed chief financial officer. Bowman most recently led the UK investment banking arm of Berenberg. Prior to this, he spent seven years in investment banking at Liberum, before which he worked in corporate finance at Canaccord and Credit Lyonnais. Bowman’s appointment becomes effective on 29 August 2023, when he will also join the Sirius board. Upon his arrival, Alistair Marks, interim CFO (and former CFO), will resume his focus fully on his role as CIO, which he has held since January 2021. Marks will also step down from the Sirius board at this year’s AGM on 10 July, remaining employed by the company to lead its investment strategy across Germany and the UK.

ATP Real Estate – Henriette Krogh Bjørneboe Fynsk has been promoted within the Danish statutory pension fund ATP to the position of CFO at its property arm. She will take up the role officially on 3 May, moving from her current job of deputy director within ATP’s data and analytics department – a job she started in 2020. Krogh Bjørneboe Fynsk is replacing Vibeke Bak Solok in the CFO role, with the latter leaving ATP Real Estate at the end of March, to take up the job of chief executive officer at the online bank Lunar, ATP said.

Europa – The pan-European real estate investment firm has appointed Ed Crockett to the newly created role of head of residential investment UK and Europe. Crockett will report to Rob Sim, managing partner. He will be responsible for leading Europa’s residential activity in the UK and Europe. Crockett will work with the fund management, transactions and asset management teams across Europa to oversee its existing residential portfolio, grow its network of local partners, while also collaborating with its in-house research capability to identify new opportunities. Crockett joins from Savills where he has spent the last 13 months as a director in the operational capital markets team, advising clients on transactions in the UK residential market. Prior to that, he spent 15 years in fund management at Abdrn, including eight years as head of UK residential investment where he oversaw the formation and implementation of the UK residential business.

Eku Energy – The energy storage company has appointed Paul Donovan chairman and Sandra Grauers Nilsson as CEO. Donovan’s experience includes CEO roles at Arqiva, Odeon and UCI Cinemas Group, Eir, and Vodafone where he led the group’s emerging markets businesses. Donovan is currently chair of software company action.ai, and a non-executive director at Arqiva. Grauers joins from Vattenfall, where she most recently served as VP of Onshore Wind. Prior to this, Grauers held business and power system development, project management and market analysis roles at Vattenfall, Statoil, and Graninge Trading. Donovan’s appointment is effective 1 April 2023, while Grauers will assume the responsibilities of interim CEO Chris Morrison in early May. Morrison has led Eku Energy since its launch by Macquarie Asset Management’s Green Investment Group in November 2022 and will return to Green Investment Group following the leadership transition, while maintaining a role on Eku’s board of directors.

LendleaseLeah Granderson has been named head of diversity, equity and inclusion in the US. She will report directly to US chief people officer Carol Gomez. Granderson will be responsible for advancing diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives across the organisation to maintain a positive corporate culture that has helped establish Lendlease as a career destination for industry talent. Granderson previously led operations for Lendlease’s privatised army lodging business. She was also a founding member of Lendlease’s diversity, equity and inclusion council, established in 2020, and recently served as co-chair of the Women @ Lendlease employee resource group. Prior to Lendlease, Granderson worked for Gobbell Hays Partners as a construction project manager.

CBRE – The global real estate adviser has appointed Miles Auger as head of hotels in the UK. Auger was previously head of hotel valuations, UK at CBRE and was responsible for leading, undertaking and co-ordinating hotel valuation projects. He has over 20 years’ experience in the real estate sector, of which 13 have been with CBRE, focused solely on the hotels market. In his new role, Auger will be responsible for driving performance and delivering CBRE’s hotels sector strategy in the UK across all business lines including valuations, advisory and capital markets, with the heads of those business lines reporting to Auger directly.

ilke Homes – The modular housebuilder has appointed David Scott to the newly created chief operating officer role to spearhead the company’s continued growth. Scott has held senior roles at two FTSE-listed businesses – Tesco and Deliveroo – where he was responsible for scaling up operations and driving efficiencies. Scott was most recently COO at ecommerce business Thread.   

Sidley AustinJames MacArthur has joined the law firm’s global energy, transportation, and infrastructure practice. MacArthur will shortly be joined by Ed Freeman. They will be based in our London office. MacArthur and Freeman focus their global practice on private equity and infrastructure funds and join Sidley from Weil, Gotshal & Manges in London.

Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner – The law firm has added partner Luke Mines to its corporate real estate and funds team in London. Mines joins from Morrison Foerster. Mines focuses his practice on helping investors, operators, and other market participants do business in the European real estate markets.

LondonMetric PropertySuzy Neubert has been appointed independent non-executive director. Neubert is currently senior independent director of Witan Investment Trust from which she has already indicated her intention to retire. She is also a non-executive director of Jupiter Fund Management, of LV= and of Isio Topco, the pensions and actuarial firm. Her executive roles have included managing director of Equities at Merrill Lynch followed by 14 years as Global head of sales & marketing at JO Hambro Capital Management.

John Laing – The KKR-owned infrastructure manager has hired Andrew Truscott from investment bank Citi as its new chief executive. Truscott, who heads the UK investment banking division at Citi, is expected to join the London-listed infrastructure company in June. Prior to joining Citi in 2018, Truscott spent 15 years at JP Morgan focused on the infrastructure, construction and industrial services markets before becoming head of Europe at the JP Morgan Infrastructure Investments Fund in 2015.

YITAleksi Laine, SVP of traffic infrastructure has been appointed interim leader of the infrastructure arm and a member of the YIT Group management team. Pasi Tolppanen, infrastructure EVP, has decided to leave to pursue his career outside of the company.