Verve Partners Limited – 18th February 2009
Verve announce Peter Chopra to lead Strategic Finance and International Development London, 18th February 2009. Verve Partners announce Peter Chopra (former CEO Synovate UK, Global CFO Synovate and Deputy Group Finance Director of Aegis) is to lead Strategic Finance and International Development at Verve. Verve Partners, the market research agency headed up by the founders of Research Now Plc, Hall and Partners, ID Factor and the former MD of FreshMinds announce that Peter Chopra joins the team. Commenting on his engagement as Partner, Strategic Finance and International Development, Chopra states: “Verve is developing a tremendous proposition for clients and staff. The team is innovative and entrepreneurial with a fantastic mix of skills backed by a very strong and proven track record in generating high and sustained organic growth in market research businesses. While Verve’s and my own focus will be on building the business in this manner, both inside and outside the UK, we will look to accelerate Verve’s ambitious strategy with mergers and acquisitions if and when that is appropriate.” Acknowledged as one of the “founding forces” behind Synovate, Chopra completed and successfully integrated over 40 acquisitions which took the business from $137m of revenue and 900 staff in 2 countries to $750m with 6,000 staff in 52 countries. During his tenure, the Synovate brand also posted the highest organic growth rates of all the major market research conglomerates. Prior to his time with Synovate, he was Deputy Group Finance Director at Aegis Group plc during which Aegis rocketed from a market capitalisation of £180m to £1.8 billion, more than doubling turnover to £5.7 billion and expanding its footprint from 1,700 staff in 18 countries to 5,800 staff in 40 countries. He is also a qualified “Big Four” trained chartered accountant, barrister-at-law and corporate financier. Andrew Cooper, Partner and CEO states: “We are very pleased to have Peter joining Verve as we develop a strong base for both UK and International growth. We are well placed to build Verve organically in multiple markets and that is our core strategy.” Cooper continues: