Mike Dennett
Chief Executive Officer
BMW Group Financial Services UK
Mike Dennett has been CEO of BMW Group Financial Services in the UK since April 2015. After qualifying as a Chartered Accountant and spending 9 years with PwC, Mike joined the BMW Group in 1999 as Head of Accounting for BMW Financial Services (GB) Ltd, followed by a period working in Munich for the BMW Bank GmbH as Head of Accounting, Reporting and Controlling, returning to the UK in 2004 as Head of Finance for BMW (UK) Ltd. Mike’s career continued with additional posts overseas, initially as Chief Financial Officer at BMW Financial Services South Africa followed by CEO of BMW Financial Services Belgium and finally, CEO BMW Financial Services Region Northern Europe (Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and the Baltic markets).
Tracey Leith
Chief Operations Officer
BMW Group Financial Services, UK
Tracey Leith has both operational and sales experience and has been with BMW Financial Services for 20 years. With a successful 18 year track record in South Africa and 2 years in the United Kingdom, in her role as Chief Operations Officer she is instrumental in driving change, supporting innovation and customer experience across the organisation. Tracey is passionate about creating the best possible experience for customers and is determined to achieve operational excellence in every aspect of her responsibilities, this comes with a desire to ensure any new or emerging technologies that create a competitive advantage is integrated within all processes across the business. Having recently completed an Innovation and Entrepreneurial Model as part of her MBA, Tracey is excited and looking forward to the potential outcomes of the BMW UK Innovation Lab 2020.
Tobias Essig
Chief Financial Officer
BMW Group Financial Services, UK
As our forward thinking CFO, Tobias has responsibility for the Finance and Administration function of BMW FS in the UK. This includes Accounting, Business and Risk Controlling, Business Intelligence, Treasury, Credit Management, Strategic Provider Management and Organisation. Before joining BMW Financial Services in UK in May 2013, Tobias was responsible for the Financial Reporting and Planning of the global BMW Group Financial Services business. During this time he successfully managed the transformation of the global financial steering process. Other key career highlights include his role as CFO and acting CEO in Thailand where he efficaciously accomplished the setup of the Financial Services entity, and as CFO in South Africa where he financially steered the company through a period of rapid growth, establishing the risk management and treasury functions and managing the new office building and relocation project. Possessing a truly visionary outlook in respect of business models, technologies and product offerings fit for the future, Tobias will be sponsoring our Wildcard category this year.
Neville Stephens
Head of IT UK & IE
BMW Group, BMW Financial Services & Alphabet
After graduating with an Honours degree in Engineering, Neville has progressed a career in IT with a number of automotive manufacturers. Joining BMW in October 2004, he has been with the Group ever since heading up a variety of roles across Project Management and IT, including 4 years as Head of IT for the Belgian market. Neville’s current position sees him take full responsibility for the IT operations across BMW UK, BMW Financial Services UK & Alphabet UK and his appetite for exposure to new and emerging technologies is all-embracing. Neville brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to the BMW UK Innovation Lab that will prove invaluable to the BMW UK Group innovation community.
Spencer Halil
Director
Alphera Financial Services
A strong believer in the power of people, Spencer Halil has been in Finance for 25 years and part of the BMW Group Financial Services family for over 13 of them. He has been the driving force behind significant management projects in both the UK and Australia, and as a committed relationship manager and strategic thinker, provides overall management accountability and direction as the Director of Alphera Financial Services in the UK. Under Spencer’s leadership, Alphera has grown consistently in a shrinking market where other lenders are exiting with 2019 reaching record levels and a 23% increase in volumes over the previous year. Spencer has played a significant role in implementing a transformational new business model for Financial Services across the BMW Group, as well as setting up partnerships for Alphera with Aston Martin and Rolls Royce Motor Cars. Under Spencer’s direction, Alphera has grown to be one of the most successful prime lenders in the motor sector with a reputation for thought leadership and setting the example for skills development, product excellence, customer orientation and compliance.
Phil Kerry
Sales & Marketing Director
BMW Group Financial Services, UK
Phil has responsibility for driving the Sales & Marketing capabilities at BMWFS in the UK. This includes new business growth and retention across the Retail & Commercial portfolio, business model development & innovation, including digitalisation. Phil, a Birmingham University commerce graduate and qualified accountant (ACMA), first joined BMW, from HSBC in 1997. In total he has over 25 years’ experience in the Financial Services Sector. Prior to his current Sales & Marketing role Phil was Chief Operating Officer for BMWFS UK, he also acted as Chief Financial Officer for BMWFS in both the UK and Australia, as Managing Director for BMWFS in Ireland and has also worked in the Head Offices of BMW in Germany. Phil has extensive Fleet company experience and has been involved in substantial portfolio sale and acquisition projects, securitisation debt sales, new business set ups (both in UK and Overseas), and is also a Pension Trustee for one of the BMW Pension Schemes.
Jemma Gregory
Head of Strategy & Business Development
BMW Group Financial Services, UK
In her role as Head of Strategy and Business Development, Jemma Gregory is leading BMW Group Financial Services in the UK in its transformation to a customer centric mobility company. Since joining BMW Group Financial Services 10 years ago, Jemma has a strong track record of structuring and managing large and complex change portfolios and programmes to deliver strategic objectives and affect organisation change, including ensuring readiness for the transition of consumer credit to the FCA regulatory regime in 2014. Jemma is a qualified Chartered Accountant, and prior to joining BMW Group, Jemma was a Senior Manager at Mazars LLP, specialising in Forensic & Investigation Services.
Laura Marie Taylor
Business Innovation Manager
BMW Group Financial Services UK
Highly motivated, commercially minded and strategically astute innovation professional responsible for driving the longer term innovative and strategic direction of the UK businesses as Business Innovation Manager for BMW Financial Services UK. Laura’s passion lies in bringing people together to achieve the perceived impossible in one of the most exciting times for the automotive & automotive finance industry. She is currently on a journey to ensure BMW UK’s internal, open and customer innovation communities collide together in the most inspirational ways to shape the next curve of individual premium mobility. Previous contributions to the UK BMW Group include laying the foundations for robust Internal Control environment & Risk Controlling function as an established ACCA professional. Laura has a proven track record in process improvement, challenging the status quo and playing an influential role in the overall operational and strategic direction of these two key finance areas, wider organisation and other UK BMW Group entities.