Realise’s chairman quits after losses rise

Published on Friday 22 February 2002 00:00

IAN STEWART, the chairman of Edinburgh-based IT group Realise, has quit his post following revelations by the company that losses for this year were likely to surpass last year’s figure of £1.17 million.

Realise - which provides business consultancy and IT services for companies, including beer giant Scottish & Newcastle - said Mr Stewart had left by "mutual consent". It is not known if he will stay on in a non-executive role.

Mr Stewart was appointed chairman of the group in October 2000, following a cash injection of 4.75m by venture capital outfit 3i.

Bruce Keith, investment director at 3i, said the decision had been "amiable".

"It was a three-way decision between 3i, Realise and Ian," he added, but declined to give any further reasons .

Mr Stewart was today unavailable for comment, but the hunt is on for his replacement, Realise said.

It is Mr Stewart’s second "departure" from an executive post in a matter of weeks. Recently, he quit the chairman’s seat at Edinburgh software recruitment firm Intagen, following a financial restructuring.

Gavin Nicholson, Realise’s managing director, said the company would post losses that were "fairly sizeable" this year, adding that they would exceed last year’s losses of 1.17m.

But he added that the company had taken steps - including the axing of ten per cent of its workforce - to address the matter and Realise would "definitely be in profit" by the following year, when turnover is expected to hit 6.5m.

Meanwhile, ScotlandIS announced today that it has appointed a new board of directors.

Figures from industry giants BT, Cisco, IBM, ICL, Microsoft, ScottishPower and Sun Microsystems have agreed to join the seven existing board members to form a new top team at the independent trade association .

Among the new faces are Maggie Morrison of Cisco Systems, Bob Downes of BT Scotland, Peter Logue at IBM and Gordon Cameron of Sun Microsystems.

Chairman Nick Kuenssberg said: "Our credibility will be increased substantially by the widely-acknowledged calibre of the new directors"