Staff news

Honorary Professor: Angus Cockburn

Angus Cockburn has been made an Honorary Professor in the College of Humanities & Social Science.

Angus Cockburn

Professor Cockburn is Interim Chief Executive of Aggreko, the world's biggest supplier of temporary power generation equipment.

He graduated from the University of Edinburgh in Business Studies and Accounting in 1985, after which he qualified as a chartered accountant and worked for six years at KPMG.

After a Master of Business Administration degree at the Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland, Professor Cockburn joined PepsiCo, where he held senior finance and business roles, including Regional Finance Director for Central Europe.

He then spent three years at textile group Dawson International as Managing Director of Pringle of Scotland, during which the business was restructured, repositioned and sold.

In 2000, Professor Cockburn became Finance Director of Aggreko, the global leader in rented power generators and a major supplier of temperature control equipment.

During the next 12 years, Aggreko grew from a market capitalisation of £275 million to £6.5 billion. Aggreko operates in more than 100 countries, and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 index of Britain’s largest companies.

Professor Cockburn became Interim Chief Executive of Aggreko in March 2014. At the end of October 2014 he will take up the post of Chief Financial Officer at Serco, an international services company.

He is a non-executive Director of GKN, a FTSE 100 engineering company, and was formerly a non-executive Director of Howden Joinery.