THE man who masterminded the rapid growth of Alexander Dennis was judged to be Scotland's leading entrepreneur in a prestigious awards event last night.
Colin Robertson, chief executive of the Falkirk-based bus builder, was named Entrepreneur of the Year at the Entrepreneurial Exchange's annual awards in Glasgow.
The awards, in association with Deloitte and media partner The Herald, are Scotland's leading and longest-standing annual awards for entrepreneurs.
Mr Robertson helped Alexander Dennis to enjoy remarkable growth in challenging conditions since he took charge in 2007.
Alexander Dennis has doubled turnover to £360 million and raised its market share at the same rate, to over 50%. Profits are set to rise significantly this year and next helped by the company's success in export markets.
Jim Boyle, head of entrepreneurial business at Deloitte, and an awards judge, said: "Colin has demonstrated fantastic entrepreneurial instinct in his ability to identify and capitalise on an opportunity in a tough economic climate. He has totally transformed the business and it is now a great example of a successful Scottish manufacturing business helping drive an export-led economic recovery."
Keith Wight, founder and chief executive of sensor design and manufacturing company SST Sensing, won the Emerging Entrepreneur award.
Judges applauded Mr Wight for spotting a gap in the market to move from selling third party devices into producing specialist sensors for manufacturers of advanced equipment.
The group's customer base rose six-fold to 450 in two years.
Mr Boyle said: "The most successful entrepreneurs know their market, identify a customer need that is not being met, and then fulfil it. Keith has done exactly that."
John Anderson, chief executive of the Entrepreneurial Exchange, said: "It is great to see yet more examples of successful entrepreneurs coming to the fore through the Exchange."
The awards were presented at a dinner at the Glasgow Hilton sponsored by Clydesdale Bank.
Alison McGregor, regional director, corporate and structured finance at Clydesdale Bank, commented: "In light of the Chancellor's statement earlier this week, it is clear that now, more than ever, Scotland needs its entrepreneurs to help to revive our economy."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article