Speaker's Biography
John Armitt CBE was appointed Chairman of the Olympic Delivery Authority on 1 September 2007. John’s career has straddled both the construction industry and the railways.
He joined John Laing as a civil engineer in 1966, and was ultimately made Chairman of Laing’s International and Civil Engineering Divisions in 1987. In 1993 he left to become Chief Executive of Union Railways, the company responsible for developing the high speed Channel Tunnel Rail Link.
In 1997 he was appointed Chief Executive of Costain and in 2001 Chief Executive of Railtrack plc, a year later he was made Chief Executive of Network Rail. John is currently also Chairman of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, a Non-Executive Director of the Berkeley Group and a member of the Advisory Boards of PwC and Siemens plc.
He was awarded the CBE in 1996 and is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Institution of Civil Engineers, he also has honorary doctorates from the universities of Portsmouth, Birmingham and Reading. http://www.london2012.com/blog/contributors/18222652.php