CEO changes at Sheffield Forgemasters

Published: 13 July 2018

Sheffield Forgemasters International Ltd will appoint a new CEO as long-standing boss, Dr Graham Honeyman, takes a global business development role.

The company has been looking to make senior management changes for a number of months as it builds on its current senior team to increase market reach and insight.

Dr Honeyman will continue working with the company as consultant head of international business development working with the new CEO, David Bond, who takes up office in August 2018. He remains the largest individual shareholder.

Dr Honeyman said: “It has been my intention to step down from the role of CEO for some time now and to allow for a new management structure to take the business forwards, David Bond will be joining us from BAE Systems as CEO from 1 August.

“I'm pleased to welcome David, who has over 30 years of experience in the Defence sector and has managed manufacturing businesses in UK and Sweden, delivering Combat Vehicles to the British Army and international customers. Most recently David was COO for BAE Systems Australia with specific responsibilities for their Maritime, Land and Integrated Systems businesses.”

The CEO change is part of a wider raft of changes at Sheffield Forgemasters, which will also include forthcoming appointments of a new chief financial officer, a new chief operating officer and a company chairman.

Brendan Kendrick has recently been appointed as company sales director and the other senior positions are due to be assigned by September.

Dr Honeyman added: “My work at Sheffield Forgemasters will continue and I will work to help David with the transition as he looks to take the business into new markets.”

Dr Honeyman will still sit in on board meetings in an observational role and his extensive customer relations experience, gleaned from years of international trade, will take precedence as he works to secure new business.

Sheffield Forgemasters remains an entirely independent company with its shares owned by members of the management and workforce, an initiative spearheaded by Dr Honeyman after he engineered a management buyout in 2005, saving the company from liquidation after former US owners, Atchison Castings, collapsed.

During his tenure as CEO at Forgemasters, Dr Honeyman has pioneered a return to apprenticeships and pushed the business into high technology markets to allow it better to compete in an increasingly competitive global market for large-scale engineered products and solutions.

His role as an ambassador for the UK steel industry and his dedication to apprenticeships and lifelong learning for the company's employees earned him a CBE in the Queen's birthday honours list, 2014.

Dr Honeyman added: “I am delighted to have recruited major talent to work with the existing team and that I will be able to help to further the business by finding new opportunities.

“I remain as dedicated to this company as I was when we engineered the management buyout and its future, and the futures of all those who have helped me along this journey, are of paramount importance to me.”

 

Dr Honeyman has won numerous regional, national and international business awards as a business leader and on behalf of the company over the past 12 years, acts as a visiting professor at the University of Sheffield and sits on the chair of the Engineering and Manufacturing Route Panel at the Institute for Apprenticeships.