THE latest appointments in the fleet industry.

Renault business team is expanding

RENAULT’S fleet business sales team has grown with the arrival of Matthew Weight and Richard Murphy.

The new business sales managers will focus on small and medium-sized fleets. Their appointment brings the sales team numbers up to 17.

Weight brings experience from Vauxhall and MG Rover and has also worked in event management at Fleet NewsNet’ parent company, Emap Automotive. Murphy has worked as Fiat sales executive for Reg Vardy and at Alfa Romeo sales specialists AutoItalia.

  • HONDA has bolstered its corporate sales department with two appointments. Ewan Ramsay is the department’s new general manager – cars, and Harvey Hughes becomes national corporate sales manager.

    Ramsay joins from the DaimlerChrysler retail group, where he was a managing director. He has also been managing director of Volvo Ireland and Volkswagen Australia. Hughes, who will manage relationships with fleets running more than 100 vehicles, joins from within Honda where he was manager – sales operations. Both will report to Ken Keir, the firm’s managing director.

  • VANESSA Nalder has replaced Martin Woodward as fleet sales manager at Mitsubishi. Woodward has been promoted to area manager. Nalder will be responsible for the specialist ‘blue light’ fleet market, and for customers based in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

  • INCHCAPE has appointed Barbara Richmond as group finance director. She will take up her post in April.

    Richmond joins from Croda International, a global speciality chemicals business, where she has been group finance director since 1997.

    Previously, she worked for Whessoe in strategy development and acquisitions and disposals. Richmond began her career at Arthur Andersen & Co, later joining GEC Alsthom.

    Also new to the board, as non-executive director, is Karen Guerra, currently president and chief executive of Colgate Palmolive France. She has a background in the same firm, as well as at the More Group and PepsiCo.

  • RAC Auto Windscreens has brought in Simon Spenser as business change director. Spenser joins from Vodafone, where he was business change and process director for its Singlepoint brand. At RAC Auto Windscreens he will lead the business change team, established late last year to manage the company’s three-year business change plan at the company’s head office in Chesterfield, Derbyshire.

  • KIA Motors is restructuring its sales, supply and planning operations following the departure of sales director Howard Slade.

    Alex Smith, who joined Kia in December 2003 as general manager of sales channel strategy, has been appointed commercial director to take on responsibility for the new structure at a strategic level.

    In his new role, he will bring together responsibility for sales programmes, logistics, co-ordination of production and distribution, implementation of systems and facilities, and development of fleet programmes and used car programmes. He will also look after regional business managers and area managers.

  • FLEET software firm cfc solutions has a new client services team leader in the shape of Melvin Jeffers. Now in charge of customer support, Jeffers has 15 years’ experience in the industry, the last five working on software help-desk issues. His job is to increase the capacity and capability of cfc’s client services support team.

  • THE new director of sales and aftersales operations at Toyota GB is Michael Cole, promoted from general manager of after sales operation. He joined Toyota in 1994 and has been in the motor industry for 20 years.