Thales Leadership in the UK

Phil Siveter

UK Chief Executive Officer

Phil Siveter is an advocate for the power of technology to positively impact lives and improve society,
but has a firm belief that it is people, when able to perform at their best, who are the true agents of change and progress.

Following a four-year tenure as CEO for Nokia in the UK & Ireland, Phil was appointed as Chief Executive
of Thales UK in October 2024.

Directly employing 7,000 people UK-wide and contributing around £2bn to the country’s GDP, Thales in
the UK provides safety and security infrastructure and sovereign capability to sectors as diverse as
defence, banking and aerospace. Its varied projects range from delivering the digital identity and
security that underpins our connected world, to the air defence capabilities that nations rely on to deter
aggression.

Phil brings over 20 years of leadership experience in the technology industry to the Thales Group and,
prior to his roles in Nokia, he worked at Ciena and BT, where he held numerous operational roles. Phil
has particularly strong experience of Public Sector & Enterprise markets and in delivering critical
services. He has also held delivery and operational positions at Sirocom, Nortel and Energis.

He is a keen advocate of the social enterprise model and has been an advisor to Social Enterprise
Berkshire and to the Beyond Boyle Foundation, which aims to transform lives through the power of
cooking. Phil also previously served on the board of the Finnish-British Chamber of Commerce (FBCC).

Phil is born and bred in Reading and lives in the local area with his wife and children.

 Chris Shaw

 Chief Operating Officer, Thales in the UK

Chris Shaw was appointed Chief Operating Officer for Thales  UK in March 2020.

He started his career in the automotive industry working for PSA  Peugeot Citroen as an electrical design engineer before senior  roles in Quality, Operations and New Model launch both in the UK and France.

After 10 years with PSA, Chris joined Goodrich Actuation Systems becoming Vice President for Secondary Flight Controls, then CEO of Goodrich Actuation Systems France, headquartered in Paris, where he ran the combined French and Italian Actuation Systems business. He returned to the UK following the acquisition of Goodrich by United Technologies to lead the creation of the Operations function within the new organisation.
 

Tommy Ayouti

Vice President, Sales & Account Management

Tommy Ayouty was appointed Vice President, Sales & Account Management for Thales in the UK in December 2023.

He started his career as a Management Consultant working for Kunde & Co International focusing on global customers in various industries. In 2003 he returned to the Armed Forces to support Danish deployments.

In 2005, Tommy joined Thales in the UK starting his career in the Aerospace Division as the Unmanned Arial Vehicle (UAV) Systems Export Marketing Manager. Since 2008 he has had various international roles throughout the organization in Scandinavia and Asia. He joins Thales UK from a position as CEO and VP of Thales in Nordics and Caucasus.

Tommy has a background in the Danish Armed Forces, including international deployments, is a graduate of the European Business School in London and has an MBA in Defence Industry Management from Cranfield University’s Defence Academy. 
 

Dr Paul Gosling

UK VP Research, Technology & Innovation

A physicist by education, Paul received a first-class honours degree in Physics from Warwick University in 1983, winning the departmental Max Plank award for the highest grades in his year.  Paul then spent three years at Oxford University, completing a doctorate in Physics in 1986 on the subject of Nuclear Quadruple Double Resonance.

Paul started his career in radar signal processing and communications technologies at STC Technology Ltd before making the transition to underwater sensing with Ferranti-Thomson in 1990. With around 25 years of experience in naval sensing systems, predominantly sonar, Paul has had considerable experience in all aspects of sonar design from advanced signal and data processing algorithm development to dealing with complex system integration and acceptance issues including several spells on sea trials with the Royal Navy.

As a senior expert / Thales Fellow in Sonar, previous positions include holding the post of technical director for the Defence Mission Systems (DMS), the C4ISR, Maritime and Security Doman, and also Technical Director for the Naval Division in the UK. Paul has also held the deputy Business Line technical director role for Underwater Systems since 2009.

Between 2004 and 2007 Paul was the technical director in charge of the UK Sonar 2087 surface ship sonar project and prior to that between 1999 and 2004 the systems architect/technical director on the sonar 2076 submarine sonar project and was responsible for architecting the stage 4 system.

More recently Paul has worked across the different businesses in DMS exploring the technologies that are required to underpin future business in Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAV), Radar and Digital RESM as well as working in the security business.

Paul is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and is a member of the Industrial Advisory board for Physics at Manchester University and for Engineering at Sheffield University.

Paul is married and has a teenage son.
 

Chris Hindle

Chief Financial Officer

Chris Hindle was appointed Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for Thales UK in 2023.

He graduated from Durham University with a degree in Natural Sciences and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA), qualifying whilst training first with Brush Transformers and as an Internal Auditor at the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation).

Chris has been with Thales since 1993, initially joining Thomson-Marconi Sonar as a Site Accountant before moving onto roles including Anti-Submarine Warfare Product Accountant, Business Line Finance Manager for Customer Services and leading a major restructuring and change team as Project Manager.

In 2001 Chris joined ABB (Swiss-Swedish engineering group) as Business Controller for Project Operations & Process Automation, across sectors including Pharmaceuticals, Pulp & Paper, Marine Turbochargers but most particularly in Oil & Gas and the construction of a 1700km oil & gas pipeline from the Caspian Sea (Baku, Azerbaijan) through Georgia & Turkey to the Mediterranean Sea, establishing a Project & Finance office in Baku before rejoining Thales as Finance Director, Thales Communications in 2006.

Chris then progressed into roles as Financial Controller of Land & Joint Systems, Finance Director of the Crawley Site and Finance Director, UK Operations & Corporate Services including responsibility for Finance transformation, building a UK Finance Shared Service and the subsequent offshoring to a captive SSC in Lisbon, Portugal.

Away from work, Chris is an avid watcher of sport, and has been to football World Cup Finals in South Africa and Brazil and he is a season ticket holder at Reading FC, although a boyhood Norwich City supporter.
Chris has 2 children and 3 step-children.
 

Suzanne Stratton

UK VP Legal & Contracts

Suzanne Stratton is the Vice President of Legal & Contracts UK and in her role, she has responsibility for the legal, contract management, export control and secretariat activities for Thales UK. She is also the UK Compliance Officer. She has over 20 years of commercial management experience.

Suzanne joined Racal Electronics Plc (acquired by Thales in 2000) and has held various positions within the Secure Communications and Information Systems and Defence Mission Systems businesses.

Suzanne graduated with a Business Studies degree with honours in 1994.
 

Lynne Watson

UK VP Human Resource

Lynne was appointed to the role of VP Human Resources in September 2017.  She is responsible for delivering the UK People Strategy, ensuring that Thales in the UK attracts, develops and retains the best talent now and in the future. 

Born and educated on the Clyde, Lynne turned down a place at University to study English Literature, choosing instead to join the Civil Service as an Apprentice, directly from school. Completing the apprenticeship with an HNC in Public Administration, Lynne then moved into the Financial Services industry progressing to Customer Service management. Lynne decided to work in Human Resources after ten years of managing large numbers of call centre teams.  She completed her CIPD Diploma while expecting her first son, and found herself doing a job she loved as an HR professional.

Lynne joined Thales in April 2009, after having held senior HR positions across a number of sectors including Telecoms, Financial Services, FMCG and complex engineering.  She joined directly from Cable & Wireless where she was Senior Business Partner to the Chief Operating Officer. Lynne has also worked for Pernod Ricard, National Australia Bank, Britannia Life and Cigna Healthcare. 

Since joining Thales, Lynne has held positions mainly focused on people development, including Head of Learning Development for our UK land defence business and Director of Talent for Thales in the UK. As an avid promoter of diversity and inclusion, and being a working mum with two teenage sons, she lives in Glasgow and uses Thales UK’s ‘smart working’ practises to balance her life in and out of work. 

Lynne is an avid rugby fan, supporting both the Glasgow Warriors and Scotland.
 

Michael Seabrook

Company Secretary

Mike is Company Secretary, Director of Ethics and UK Compliance Officer for Thales UK.

Mike started his career in the Group Secretariat of Racal Electronics Plc in 1986 where he qualified as a Chartered Secretary in 1991.

During his time with Racal he held various positions including Head of Insurance, Assistant Company Secretary of Chubb Security Plc and worked in the Secretariat of Racal Telecom (now Vodafone Group Plc) which included the flotation and eventual demerger of Vodafone from Racal.