Yvonne McAulay, Author at St Andrews Business Club

Alban Denton

6th April 20176th April 2017 Yvonne McAulay

Alban Denton, Managing Director of Loch Duart Ltd, was the speaker at the Club’s AGM evening on April 5 2017 – the best attended in many years.

Loch Duart Ltd is one of the world’s leading producers of premium whole fresh Scottish salmon. Alban is also Non-Executive Director of Suttons Group, the international transport and logistics group.

A graduate in Agricultural and Food Marketing and an MBA, he has delivered profit growth and restructuring as well as organisational and cultural change in a variety of food manufacturing and agricultural businesses over more than 26 years – from Kettle Produce and Grampian Country Food Group to Warburtons and Loch Duart Ltd.

Alban also has retail experience in both store operations and buying with Marks and Spencer having started his career managing the brand’s flagship Food Hall at the Marble Arch store.

He explained the importance of sustainability in fish production before going through Loch Duart Ltd’s background and its transformation from 30 staff producing 1,800 tonnes of fish in 1999 to 115 staff who’ve delivered its transformation to 5,000 tonnes in 2016.

Rave reviews

He then talked the rapt audience through Loch Duart’s USPs – including low stocking density, rotation scheme, natural cleaning, feeding priorities and top Omega 3 concentration – before explaining how they tackle sea lice and the key link between welfare and taste.

The result is a list of rave product reviews from top chefs (Gordon Ramsay, Raymond Blanc and Rick Stein) and food critics as well as being sourced for Royal events.

One of Alban’s key themes was how the success has been built through getting the local community energised by the company’s mission and helping it share in its success, collectively and individually – one staff member received rapid promotion after he identified her ability to play a key role at a higher level.

He also shared a very candid appraisal of what makes Loch Duart different, how he helped steer it through an existential crisis as well as its progress in the last 12 months and priorities going forward.

Finally, Alban answered questions on a variety of topics, including how it gets its salmon to chefs around the world ready for them to cook 48 hours earlier than its competitors.

For more information about Loch Duart Ltd, go to www.lochduart.com/

Cyber Risk Evening Event

16th March 201717th March 2017 Yvonne McAulay

Speakers: Colin McLean and Dr Natalie Coull from Abertay University’s Division of Computing and Mathematics plus Susan Riccio from PIB Insurance.

Colin McLean is a Lecturer in Computing at Abertay University and Certified Ethical Hacker trained in Internal and External Penetration tester.

In 2006, Colin developed the BSc in Ethical Hacking at Abertay University – the world’s first undergraduate degree with the word “hacking” in the title. In 2015, Colin was listed in the Top 100 people driving the digital agenda in Scotland by Holyrood magazine.

Dr Natalie Coull is programme tutor for the MSc in Ethical Hacking at Abertay University and teaches a range of subject areas from programming to ethical hacking.

Natalie won the Outstanding Woman in Cyber award at the inaugural Scottish Cyber Awards last year and is involved in a number of initiatives to increase the number of women who choose to study computing.

Natalie and Colin explained the rationale and approach behind ethical hacking before giving examples of recently-discovered common website vulnerabilities and the costs if your company is affected.

Ethical hacker and lecturer Colin McLean of Abertay University at the event.

They then went through some typical hacker/victim scenarios, showing how people can make a vital mistake – clicking a link or opening an attachment – which gives the hacker access and then demonstrated the range of things the hacker can then do.

Colin McLean and Dr Natalie Coull from Abertay University demonstrating typical hacker/victim scenarios.

Before the talk they profiled the Club and an organisation connected with it and explained the weaknesses they found. Finally, Colin and Natalie explained the things you can do to protect yourself and your organisation.

Susan Riccio is a Senior Financial Lines Account Executive at PIB Insurance Brokers. Susan has more than 30 years’ experience in the insurance industry. Her specialisms include cyber liability, professional indemnity and management liability.

Susan Riccio from PIB Insurance Brokers outlined the evolution of cyber risk and regulation before going on to explain cyber risk and data breach insurance and the types of losses and incident/crisis response services it covers.

Susan first outlined the evolution of cyber risk and regulation, before going on to explain cyber risk and data breach insurance and the types of losses it covers and the incident/crisis response services included. Finally Susan gave examples of past claims and how you can mitigate against cyber risk in a bid to protect your balance sheet and your organisation’s reputation.

Information about the BSc in Ethical hacking at Abertay University can be found on the university website at https://www.abertay.ac.uk/studying/undergraduate/bsc-ethical-hacking/

Details of cyber risk insurance available from PIB Insurance can be found at https://www.pib-insurance.com/sectors/corporate/

Owen Hazel

19th October 201421st February 2017 Yvonne McAulay

Owen Hazel, Director of B Jannettas Gelateria

It’s not often a business club talk can be described as tasty as well as terrific, but the latest one heard by St Andrews Business Club members at B Jannettas Gelateria on South Street was both!

The reason was the speaker, Owen Hazel, who with his wife Nicola has been running the business for the last 20 years. As well as explaining the history of the business — which was started in 1908 by Nicola’s great-grandfather, Bennett Jannetta, as a soda parlour and tobacconist — Owen demonstrated how they make top-quality traditional gelato using a recipe and vertical drum, before giving samples to his eager audience. Earlier they also sampled a fruit sorbet.

Owen went on to explain how the fourth generation running the family firm, which won two prestigious awards this year, plan to transform the South Street premises next year into a single open-space ‘gelatorium’, allowing customers to see their ice cream being made. Other plans for the future development of the brand were also outlined, before Owen answered questions.

Club President Kenneth Russell, gave a vote of thanks.