Nominet's board is responsible for making strategic and policy decisions.
The board meets regularly to discuss strategic, policy and operational issues and the communique from the meetings are archived here.
Bob Gilbert - Chairman
Bob is a highly experienced corporate lawyer and has been involved in most aspects of company and commercial law including insolvency. He was one of the few solicitors selected by the DTI to act as a Licensed Insolvency Practitioner. His legal career spanned 35 years and was spent at Wragge & Co where he was deputy senior partner until his retirement in April 2004.
Bob has wide-ranging business and boardroom experience having held many directorships of both private and public companies. He is currently Chairman of Paintbox Limited and the Government's Motor Sport Development Board (MDUK).
Bob has been Chairman since 2005.
Lesley Cowley - Chief Executive
Lesley has been Managing Director/Chief Executive of Nominet since 2002.
She is responsible for leading Nominet and for the development and implementation of strategy.
She leads relationship building and liaison with Nominet members and stakeholders and international representation and leadership in the Internet field.
In 2007, she won the CBI First Women Award for Technology. In 2006, she was a top five finalist in Britain’s Best Boss awards and received a special commendation.
Lesley is an elected Council Member of the Country Code Names Supporting Organisation (ccNSO) and is a Fellow of the British Computer Society, The Institute of Credit Management and The Chartered Management Institute.
Lesley is a Trustee of the Nominet Trust and the Jenner Hall charity. She has an MBA, with distinction.
Gordon Dick - Non-Executive Director
Gordon Dick has been an active participant in Nominet UK for many years, initially as a tag holder, then as a member of the Policy Advisory Board and more latterly as a non-executive director.
Gordon graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a BSc (Hons) in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science. In 1995 he was involved in the start up of an e-commerce and web design company for which he was technical director. In this role he ran a large number of secure e-commerce sites and the surrounding online marketing environments. Having spent two years working overseas, he is now an independent project consultant.
Gordon has been a non-executive director since 2004.
Clive Grace - Non-Executive Director
Clive has a keen interest in the internet as an end user across the range of his business and personal interests, and a particular commitment to its self regulation. He was co-opted to the Board in December 2008 following a search by recruitment consultants Veredus, and a competitive selection process.
He has extensive Board level experience in the not-for-profit, public and commercial sectors. He Chairs the Research Councils’ Shared Services Centre Ltd, Supporta plc, the Local Better Regulation Office, and the Advisory Forum of the Board of BT Wales. He is the Honorary Secretary of the Solace Foundation, and an Honorary Research Fellow at Cardiff Business School.
He is a Life Member of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (though not a professional accountant), and has been a CIPFA Council member since 2003 and Chairs their International Board. Until 2007 he served on the Financial Reporting Council (which is the steward of the Combined Code of Corporate Governance) with a special remit for not-for-profit bodies.
He has been appointed to Nominet’s Audit Committee.
He is a former Deputy-Auditor General of Wales, and the former Chief Executive of Torfaen County Borough Council.
He has a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Birmingham, a Master’s Degree from the University of California, a Doctorate from the University of Oxford, and a Professional Diploma in Management from the Open University. He is also a qualified (but non-practising) lawyer.
Nora Nanayakkara - Non-Executive Director
As a Non Executive Director, Nora brings experience in online business, digital media and international domain markets within both New Media and the not-for-profit sector. She provides business consultancy to UK charities through Pilotlight and working at Sedo/Adlink Media over the last six years has given her valuable insight into both the primary and secondary international domain markets.
Nora is also an active member of Nominet's own policy advisory body (PAB), since being elected in June 2008. Her formal education includes an MBA in International Business in addition to a BA from University College Cork, Ireland and on-the-job training in media communications and strategic financial modeling.
Jonathan Robinson - Non-Executive Director
Jonathan is a co-founder of Group NBT (formerly NetBenefit) plc and was Chief Operating Officer of the Group until June 2009. At Group NBT, Jonathan was most recently responsible for the areas of product management and associated strategic planning, fulfilment operations and industry policy issues, as well as acquisition integration projects.
He holds a PhD in Materials Engineering and a BSc (Physics) from the University of Cape Town. He previously held research posts at Imperial College, London from 1993-1994 and then the Rolls Royce Technology Centre at the University of Cambridge until 1997.