Hollick to leave United Business Media
Non-executive director of drinks giant Diageo Clive Hollick is to step down as chief executive of UK publishing-to-market research group United Business Media, the company said today.
Hollick, who oversaw the sale of the Express newspapers when the company was known as United News & Media, will leave in May.
He will then be 60 years old and ready to “move on to new opportunities”, although Lord Hollick did not elaborate in a statement from UBM.
The company, which has a 35% stake in terrestrial TV station five and owns a string of business-to-business titles, said it would choose Hollick’s successor from a range of internal and external candidates. It hopes to announce the appointment by the end of this year.
Hollick became managing director of media and financial services group MAI in 1974 and merged it with United News and Media in 1996 to create an international media group, whose current portfolio includes the titles Property Week and Building Design and the market research group NOP World.
As well as the sale of the Express newspaper titles to Northern & Shell for £125m (€183.7m) in 2000, the company offloaded ITV franchises Anglia, Meridian and HTV after failing in its bid to merge with Carlton.
Hollick is also a non-executive director of drinks giant Diageo and US aerospace company Honeywell, as well as chairman of London’s South Bank Centre.
The father of three, who was made a life peer in 1991, started his career as a banker after studying at the University of Nottingham.
He has been an adviser to successive leaders of the Labour Party since 1987 and took part in a campaign to win over City support for the party during the 1990s.
United Business Media, which co-owns TV station five with Luxembourg-based RTL, recently saw the television channel deliver its first annual operating profit.
