Meet the National Grid ESO Board

Fintan Slye

Chair of the NGESO Board

Fintan Slye is Director of the ESO.  Prior to this he was CEO of the EirGrid Group, where he oversaw a major change programme that included integrating renewables onto the Irish electricity grid and a new approach to public consultation and engagement.

Fintan is a board member of Entso-e, the European Organisation for Transmission System Operators and a Fellow of the Institute of Engineers Ireland. He holds a Masters in Engineering Science and an MBA from University College Dublin.

Hannah Nixon

Independent Non Executive Director

Hannah has extensive experience in economic regulation, most recently as Chief Executive Officer of the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR).

She has been a member of several advisory boards, including the Government Economics Service, the ORR advisory panel and water regulator Ofwat’s Future Regulation advisory panel.

Hannah currently sits on the board of the Channel Islands Competition and Regulatory Authority (CICRA).

Gillian Merron

Independent Non Executive Director

Gillian has been CEO of the Board of Deputies of British Jews since 2014, where she manages the national representative body and voice of the diverse Jewish community in Britain

A successful politician, Gillian was MP for Lincoln between 1997 and 2010 and a Government Minister from 2006 to 2010, with roles in the Health, International Development and Transport departments as well as in the Cabinet and Foreign and Commonwealth Offices.

Paul Plummer

Independent Non Executive Director

Paul is Chief Executive of Rail Delivery Group (RDG) and Non-Executive Director at Network Homes. His previous roles include Group Strategy Director on the Board of Network Rail and President of European Infrastructure Managers.

Throughout his extensive career, Paul has advised companies, regulators and governments on business strategy, restructuring, privatisation, corporate finance and regulation in the transport and utilities sectors.

Kayte O’Neill

Head of Markets

Kayte is Head of Markets for the ESO, accountable for developing markets to enable future operation of Great Britain’s electricity system on the path to net zero.

She joined National Grid PLC in 2002 and has held a wide variety of senior roles across the business, most recently as Head of Strategy and Regulation for the ESO. Prior to that she spent three years in Boston with National Grid’s US electricity distribution businesses.

Kayte holds a first class degree in Business Economics and is a graduate of the Harvard Business School Program for Leadership Development.

Gregg Smith

Finance Director

Gregg joined National Grid ESO in April 2020 after 21 years with IMI PLC, a FTSE 250 engineering firm that he joined as a graduate following his degree in Business Economics at the University of Liverpool.

A qualified Chartered Management Accountant (ACMA and CGMA), Gregg progressed from Finance Manager, Finance Director, Regional Controller and Divisional Director of FP&A to Chief Financial Officer for IMI Critical Engineering Europe - Power and Nuclear.

He held several global roles across all three IMI divisions throughout his career and has lived in the USA, Spain and Switzerland.

John Linwood

Independent Non-Executive Director

John has extensive experience in digital transformations, delivering large scale software and IT infrastructure projects, and helping businesses adopt new technologies. Most recently he was Chief Technology Officer at Earth-I, a Satellite Earth observation company using Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence to provide insights from satellite imagery.

Prior to Earth-I John was Executive Vice President at Wood Mackenzie, an energy research consultancy, spent 4 years as Chief Technology Officer at the BBC, 5 years as Senior Vice President at Yahoo and 11 years in senior roles within Microsoft.

He also holds a number of non-executive roles including Brooks Macdonald.

Regina Moran

Independent Non-Executive Director

Regina is an experienced CEO and Non-Executive Director, with a background in digital transformation across a number of different sectors.

A chartered engineer with a first class honours MBA, she held roles at DMR Consulting, was CEO of Fujitsu Ireland before becoming CEO of Fujitsu UK and Ireland. Most recently she was Enterprise Director at Vodafone Ireland. She has also served as President of Engineers Ireland and as a Non-Executive Director of EIRGrid, the electricity system operator in the Republic of Ireland.