Robert Harwood
Company Secretary, Telefónica Europe
Robert initially worked in a benefits consultancy advising companies on employee share schemes and managing a team of share schemes administrators. He then joined BT’s Company Secretary’s Department where he held a number of roles including share registration and shareholder relations, stock exchange compliance and company secretarial administration for subsidiaries and joint ventures. In 2001, on the demerger of the O2 mobile business from BT, he was appointed as Assistant Company Secretary to O2 plc (a FTSE 30 company) where he set up up a new Secretariat function. Following the acquisition of O2 by Telefonica S.A. in 2006, Robert was appointed to the position of Company Secretary, Telefonica Europe plc (the former O2 plc now unlisted) with a reporting line to the Telefonica Secretariat in Madrid.