RPMI has promoted Julian Cripps to managing director of its investment business and made him an executive director, it announced today.
Cripps will lead RPMI Railpen, the in-house investment manager for the £25bn Railways Pension Scheme, reporting to chief executive Chris Hitchen.
He joined RPMI in 2015 as chief operating officer of investments from River and Mercantile Asset Management. In this role, he led on the insourcing of asset management at the scheme.
In his new role, Cripps (pictured) will be in charge of RPMI Railpen’s investment team comprising three investment directors, Ciarán Barr, Paul Bishop and Richard Williams, who are responsible for day-to-day portfolio management.
He will also sit on the RPMI board with a remit to ensure that the investment business produces “good long-term outcomes for railway employers, workers and their families,” RPMI said.
RPMI has also added Richard Jones and John Chilman to the board as non-executives.
Jones is a director of RPMI’s parent, the Railways Pension Trustee Company (RPTCL). He has more than 20 years’ engineering, commercial and general management experience in the rail industry, including at British Rail, Virgin, and Alstom. He is currently at US consultant AECOM, where he leads UK corporate real estate.
Chilman is group pensions director at FirstGroup and chairman of RPTCL. RPMI said he brings substantial institutional investment experience through his management of FirstGroup’s scheme and as a former chairman of RPTCL’s own investment committee.
Commenting on the appointments, Hitchen said: “It’s fantastic that we have such strong executive and non-executive directors joining our boards. I know that Julian will be a great leader for our investment business, and that Richard and John will provide strong governance whilst maintaining and strengthening our links to our rail stakeholders and the members whose pensions we are here to pay.”
