FFEI names Paul Watson as new chief operating officer

Print Solutions

FFEI has announced the appointment of Paul Watson as chief operating officer (COO). This is a new role within FFEI created as a result of significant growth experienced by the business over the past 12 months.

Paul will be responsible for driving operational excellence – optimising international business operations, setting up new capabilities and embedding ‘lean manufacturing’, all in support of the businesses plan for continued growth.

‘Paul is a seasoned leader who has a history of delivering results. He is uniquely qualified to drive strategic growth, with a focus on operational excellence,’ commented Andy Cook, managing director, FFEI. ‘I am looking forward to working with Paul to align FFEI’s world class engineering excellence with industry leading operational practices to drive and extend the next generation of FFEI’s digital imaging technologies.’

Paul joined FFEI in January 2019 and is an accomplished and commercially focused COO who is well versed at operating within highly regulated environments having previously worked at board level in defence and aerospace sectors. Paul has significant experience of working in global corporations as well as privately owned SMEs.

Commenting on his appointment Paul explained, ‘I have a passion for privately funded, high tech businesses that are fuelled by British engineering excellence. I was impressed with how FFEI has consistently innovated in the realm of digital imaging, thanks to an impressive array of talented scientists, engineers and software specialists. Having seen the long term product and technology road maps and the investments being made, it is clearly an exciting time to be joining the business. I’m excited by the opportunity to help to grow the business still further.’

Prior to this appointment, Paul was operations, quality and business improvement director at Kelvin Hughes, an international developer, manufacturer and supplier of navigation, surveillance and security radar systems to commercial and military sectors. From 2010 through to 2018 he drove the transformation of Kelvin Hughes’ operations, quality and business improvement to meet demands of the military market. In that role, he managed a team of over 75 employees spanning global operations, quality and business improvement.

Paul has also held various senior roles at a range of high quality technical product based companies including aerospace and defence.