Rory Keogh – MD of Gomaco
Rory Keogh is MD of GOMACO International Limited. His role within GOMACO covers sales, service and distributor development. Rory’s territories include Europe, Scandinavia the Russian Federation, the Middle East, Africa, Parts of the Indian Sub-Continent and Central Asia.
Following a 5-year Mechanical Engineering apprenticeship with an agricultural equipment manufacturer, he has been involved with the construction industry for his entire career with either OEMs or Distributors, working as a field engineer across Europe, Middle East, and Africa. He joined GOMACO International in Jan 1984, was promoted to Director of Sales and Marketing for GOMACO International in 2001, and MD in 2007.
Rory is also a council member of Britpave, the British In-situ Concrete Paving Association as well as a Director with Eupave the European In-situ Concrete Paving Association and has recently been part of an AEM working group on the New Governments Overseas Trade Policy.
Nick Ground – Managing Director, GKD Technologies Ltd
Nick is the owner of GKD Technologies Ltd – and has been an active member of the CEA since 1986. GKD is one of our smaller SMEs in the association and Nick champions the small company perspective at the CEA. Being a keen exporter, Nick has been to many of the CEA-supported exhibitions and is a supporter of the CEA’s International Business Group. He is an electronics engineer and loves technology. He’s a tennis player and dinghy sailor and knows nothing about football.
Paul Ross – Consultant Director, Ricardo plc
Paul has an extensive background across various industrial, commercial and technology sectors on an international basis. Having qualified in engineering, most of his professional career has been spent in executive management level positions operating on a global basis and being closely aligned to business, product and distribution development, marketing, commercial and general management. He has many years of international experience across a wide range of disciplines and has operated in a number of main board and senior roles in both private and multi-national companies. Paul is a past President and current Director of the CEA and has been actively involved in CEA activities over the past three decades.
Charles Stevenson – General Manager, JCB
A graduate in International Politics and Intelligence, Charles joined JCB in 2006 and was posted to Brazil as Product Manager. In 2010 he became Regional Sales Manager and was involved in the establishment of a £100M factory near São Paulo, to supply Latin America.
In 2013 Charles returned to the UK to take up the role of Regional Manager for Southern Europe, Israel and Turkey, moving to JCB`s London office as General Manager in 2016 where he is responsible for interacting with global infrastructure, Tier 1`s and government and external affairs.
Sam Mottram – Caterpillar
Sam Mottram became Caterpillar’s Global Commercial Manager for Mini Excavators and Small Dozers in February 2016, returning to his Caterpillar roots in the small equipment division where he began his Caterpillar career in 2001 as a Mechanical Design Engineer. In this position, Sam leads a globally diverse team in all the commercial aspects of Caterpillar’s range of Mini Excavators and Small Dozers sourced from 4 global facilities and distributed via Caterpillar’s dealers. Sam’s prior positions at Caterpillar include roles in Product Support, Marketing, Sales, Engineering and Contract Manufacturing Agreements in both the small product families and also in Underground Mining; he has worked across the globe, living and working in the US, Switzerland, France, UK and Germany. Sam also spent 13 months working in a small family business as Managing Director of eCow Ltd until December 2014 leading a small team in designing and manufacturing wireless dairy welfare monitoring products. The eCow farmBolus was named Overall Winner of the Award for Innovation at the UK Dairy Industry Awards in September 2014 and Sam was voted in the SW Business Insider Magazine’s ’42 under 42′ as one of the most exciting young entrepreneurs in the south west in 2014. Sam lives near Caterpillar’s Leicester facility with his wife and two boys, he is a keen Leicester Tigers rugby fan and coaches his eldest son’s rugby team, he also keeps chickens.
Kate Wickham – Gate 7 Ltd
Kate Wickham MBE is the Managing Director of family business Gate 7 Ltd based in the North East of England. Following a 4 year business degree at Leeds Metropolitan University in 2005, Kate began working at Gate 7, assuming a number of roles in Account Management and Business Development before becoming MD in 2011. Gate 7 specialises in the supply of decals and printed components to the Construction Equipment Market, operating out of 3 sites in the UK and USA.
Nick Allen – CEO, SMT GB the exclusive distributor of Volvo Construction Equipment in Great Britain
Nick is an economics graduate from the University of Reading and is also a professionally qualified accountant.
He has a wide range of experience gained in senior management positions in international environments, having worked for SmithKline Beecham, Bayer Group and AVX/Kyocera before joining Volvo in 2006.
Since January 2014 Nick was Managing Director for Volvo Construction Equipment’s distributor in Great Britain. Following the acquisition of this business by SMT in September 2017 Nick now holds the position of CEO for the newly formed organisation.
Nick is married, with four grown up sons and is passionate about all sport but especially cricket, golf and Walsall FC.
David Waine – British Steel
David is product sales manager for British Steel.
A dedicated, motivated and experienced Sales Manager within the Mining and Earthmoving Industry with domestic and international commercial experience including direct management of personnel within a number of different business/product units of a global manufacturing company.
A strategic thinker with proven interpersonal and communication skills, I am objective driven and able to lead a team from the front to achieve our goals
Mark Ormond – Manitou
Mark joined Manitou UK as Managing Director in 2018. His remit covers both the Manitou and Gehl brands with full responsibility for operations in Great Britain, Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. The range includes products for Construction, Agricultural, Industrial, Warehouse and Logistics markets.
Prior to joining Manitou, Mark’s career was primarily in the Agricultural sector having been the MD at three leading equipment manufacturers over a 15-year period, Grimme, Lemken and SAME Deutz-Fahr respectively. Mark is an active member of the Agricultural Engineers Association, has been a Board Member of it since 2013 and was its President from 2017 to 2018.
Damien McCormack – Managing Director, Nylacast
Damien originally joined Nylacast in 1991 as part of a Teaching Company Scheme (TCS) and commenced his role as Managaging Director in 2016. In this role he is responsible for the leadership and management of Nylacast Engineered Products.
Damien has over 26 years’ experience in the field of engineering polymers, within various roles including Research & Development, Production & Manufacturing, Procurement, Operations and General Management.
Having graduated with a BSc in Combined Science, Damien also holds an MSc in Polymer Engineering.