Paragon Entertainment Ltd.
PEL:LN
Overview
Company Profile
Classification
Financials
Corporate
Board of Directors
Mark Taylor
Non-Executive Chairman
Mark Taylor (55) has over a decade’s private equity and venture capital experience. He has held a number of executive positions at LSE-listed Richemont and VenFin, and as CEO of JSE-listed Intervid where he led the successful turnaround of the group Through his career Mark has managed teams in excess of 500 staff spread across four continents. During the last five years he was Managing Director of Global Aquariums BV, a business which develops, owns and manages aquariums in emerging markets. Here he successfully developed Turkey’s first giant public aquarium, Turkuazoo, in Istanbul, and which he sold in 2013. Mark is a master’s world swimming medalist and a keen surfer. On the rare occasion that he is not available on his mobile, it's probably because the surf is up! Mark is a member of the Audit Committee, Nominations Committee and Remuneration Committee.
John Dobson
Chief Executive Officer
John Dobson brings over 30 years’ experience in various blue chip manufacturing companies. After initially training as an accountant with Denso, John quickly moved into general management and has worked for GE Lighting, Alcatel, Nexans, Superior Essex, LS Cable and Hill & Smith. In the last 15 years John has been focused on upscaling International manufacturing organisations in the UK, Central Europe and Asia. He has undertaken several roles of succession and continued growth. From UK Managing Director to the Managing Director of Asia Pacific based in Shanghai, Vice President of Strategy and Product Development based in France as well as Managing Director Asia Pacific based in Thailand. Besides being a motivated and driven executive, John has been instrumental in giving shape to some of the strategic and innovative initiatives in all the companies he has worked for. His sound knowledge of business processes and operations, coupled with his keen financial acumen give John the ability to be an effective and well-rounded leader. Despite John’s well-travelled career he has tried to maintain a solid work life balance and enjoys spending time at home with his now grown up family. He is also a keen runner with 3 marathons and several Great North Runs under his belt.
Mark Pyrah
Development Director and Founder
Mark Pyrah (43) has over 23 years of experience in the entertainment industry and is one of its most well regarded characters. Over the past 11 years, Mark, together with Peter Holdsworth, has developed Paragon Creative into a market leading theming, interactives, fit-out and model-making business with an unrivalled client base and reputation. In that time Mark has been personally involved in over 500 projects in more than 30 countries and spent three years as a UK director of the Themed Entertainment Association. Before Paragon, Mark established one of the UK’s first multi-media businesses, working on communication strategies for M&C Saatchi, the BBC, Financial Dynamics, Lloyds TSB, BT, M&S and British Airways. Marks commitment means there is little free time but when he has the opportunity he heads with his family to the North East coast to sail, walk and unwind.
David Bridgford
Non-Executive Director
David Bridgford (53) was Merlin Entertainment plc’s Strategy Director from 2010 to 2016. During that time he oversaw business planning, strategic acquisitions and corporate development for the rapidly growing Group. Amongst other things, this involved acquiring businesses in Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Thailand, Turkey and China. One of the businesses he bought was an aquarium then run by Paragon chairman, Mark Taylor (would you buy a used aquarium from your chairman?) Prior to taking on the strategy role at Merlin, David ran Merlin’s finance department as Director of Corporate Finance, a role he also performed for The Tussauds Group from 2002 until it was sold to Merlin in 2007. David trained as an accountant with Touche Ross, a Deloitte predecessor firm, and from 1990 to 2002 was in the Deloitte corporate finance advisory team in London specialising in private equity and leisure transactions, latterly as a partner. In his spare time David is learning beekeeping and is a keen skier and runner, when his ageing office legs allow.