UK telecoms giant BT Group has lined up Mark Gregory as its next chief legal and public affairs officer to replace Sabine Chalmers who is retiring from the role.
Gregory was most recently general counsel at Rolls-Royce, before leaving earlier this year. At BT, he will lead its legal, regulatory affairs, company secretariat and compliance functions, as well as oversee policy and public affairs matters. He will take up his new role on 1 December.
Writing on LinkedIn, BT CEO Allison Kirkby said: “Mark joins us from another iconic British company, Rolls-Royce, where he was a key member of the executive committee, contributing to what is now recognised as a historic financial and business turnaround.”
Gregory spent 16 years at Rolls-Royce, more than a decade of them as GC. He originally joined as chief counsel of its civil aerospace unit in 2010, before being made deputy head of legal in 2013 and then head of legal and commercial in 2014.
Prior to joining the main Rolls-Royce business, he also spent five years at Rolls-Royce & Partners Finance as legal counsel and company secretary – a joint venture between Rolls-Royce and GATX Capital specialising in aircraft engine leasing.
He started his legal career at legacy firm Hogan Lovells.
Writing on LinkedIn, he said: “From one iconic company to another. After 20 action-packed years at Rolls-Royce, and then some time away to ‘reset’ with family and friends, it’s time for that new adventure I talked about all those months ago.
“It took one conversation with Allison Kirkby to be hooked. BT plays a critical role for its customers and is ‘mission-critical’ for the whole country. It is in the middle of a once-in-a-generation investment to upgrade the UK’s digital backbone – at the same time as driving a major transformation of its own. There is so much to get stuck in to, supporting Allison and the team to build a better BT, for all of us.”
Chalmers, meanwhile, will remain on until the end of January to support the transition. She leaves after eight years as group GC. Prior to joining BT, she was chief legal and corporate affairs officer at beer behemoth Anheuser-Busch InBev and GC of Diageo’s North American business. Like Gregory, she started out at Hogan Lovells.
Rolls-Royce hired Maria Varsellona from Unilever to replace Gregory as CLO back in March.
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