Board of Directors
Executive Directors
Laurence Walker – Chief Executive
Laurence is a founding director of SSP & is currently Chief Executive, taking responsibility for all three divisions. Laurence has worked in the insurance technology sector for over 20 years, both in the UK & overseas. He has experience in insurance companies, broker software houses & industry bodies culminating, prior to joining the SSP buy-in team, in the role of Development & Corporate Director for CSC’s Retail Insurance Division.
Carol Thompson – Chief Financial Officer
Carol joined SSP in 2011 as Chief Financial Officer. Carol was previously Chief Financial Officer at utilities firm Electricity North West and Operating Partner at venture capital group Marwyn LLP. She has a wealth of board level experience across a variety of sectors, including insurance, having worked for six years in a variety of roles at RSA.
Non-Executive Directors
Brad Henske – Non-Executive Chairman
Brad is a Managing Director at Hellman & Friedman (H&F). Prior to joining H&F in 2007, he was the General Manager of the Consumer Tax Group (TurboTax) & the Chief Financial Officer at Intuit. Previously, he was the Chief Financial Officer of Synopsys, a Partner at Oak Hill Capital Partners (Robert M. Bass Group), the Chief Financial Officer at American Savings Bank & a partner at Bain & Company.
He is the Chairman of Activant Solutions, Datatel, Inc. & IRIS Software Group Limited. He is or formerly was a member of the Board of Directors of Goodman Global, Inc., Associated Materials, LLC, VeriFone Holdings, Inc., Williams Scotsman, Inc., Grove Worldwide L.L.C., Reliant Building Products Inc. & American Savings Bank.
Brad graduated with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Rice University & earned an MBA, with Distinction, from the Wharton School.
David Rasche – Senior Non-Executive Director
David Rasche was co-founder of SSP & has been in the IT sector for almost 40 years, with 30 years leading & chairing software businesses. He has been involved in the insurance sector for 21 years this year. He was Yorkshire Business Leader of the Year in 2008 & Quoted Companies Chairman of the Year in 2009.
Nick Bate – Non-Executive Director
Nick was a founding member of SSP, joining as part of the original management buy-in team in 2002. He served as the Group’s Finance Director for over nine years before moving to a Non-Executive Director role in October 2011. Nick has a wide range of board level experience within manufacturing & service environments both in the UK & internationally.
Gren Folwell – Non-Executive Director
Gren was appointed as Non-Executive Chairman of SSP at the time of the management buy-in in March 2002 & became Senior Non-Executive Director at the start of 2006. Gren was the Deputy Chief Executive of the Halifax Plc from 1996 to 1999, having joined its board as Group Finance Director in 1989. During his time on the board, Gren was involved in the merger & integration of the Halifax & Leeds Permanent Building Societies, the £18 billion flotation of Halifax Plc & the £750 million takeover of Birmingham Midshires Building Society.
Since retiring from the Halifax, Gren has built up a portfolio of non-executive directorships in the financial services industry & the public sector including Debt Free Direct plc, Partnerships UK plc & Institute of Public Finance Limited.
Nick Discombe – Non-Executive Director
Nick joined the SSP board early in 2009 & was CEO at the time of exit of US based Witness Systems (NASDAQ – WITS) for just over $1bn in June 2007. Since leaving Witness, Nick has been active in the US/UK private equity community & is currently Chairman of private equity backed business, Stepstone Solutions - a global leader in Talent Management.
Nick’s other current responsibilities include his directorship at Iris which supplies business management solutions to over 60,000 customers. In 2009 Nick also joined Lord Young as part of the panel of national judges for Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year Program.
Back in March 2003, Nick joined Witness Systems following the successful merger of Witness Systems & Eyretel. Nick spent five years with Eyretel & was CEO in 2000 when Eyretel successfully completed its IPO on the London Stock Exchange.
Stephen Duckett – Non-Executive Director
Stephen is a Managing Director of Hellman & Friedman based in the firm's London office. H&F is one of the leading investors in software globally & is currently investing from their sixth fund of $8.4 billion.
Stephen’s investment focus for H&F is on software, information services, technology & internet related companies in Europe. Stephen is currently Chairman of IRIS Software Group & was previously a Managing Director of ICG, a publicly quoted US venture capital investment firm & prior to that spent many years with Apax Partners, again focused on software & technology investments.
Stephen is an alumni of Oxford University, from which he has a first class MA in Engineering, Economics & Management & of Harvard Business School, where he was awarded an MBA with Distinction & was a Fulbright Scholar.
Blake C. Kleinman – Non-Executive Director
Blake is a Director at Hellman & Friedman in the London office.
Blake is a Director of Gartmore Investment Management plc & was active in the firm's investments in Arch Capital Group, Axel Springer AG, ProSiebenSat.1 AG, Mondrian Investment Partners Ltd & The Nielsen Company.
Prior to joining the firm in 2001, Blake worked in the Mergers, Acquisitions & Restructurings Department at Morgan Stanley & Co. in New York.
Blake graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College & was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.