Name: Anthony Catterson

Was: Management trainee at Marks & Spencer

Now: CEO at Expansys

Years in grocery: Two

Career background: While at college, Catterson took a part-time post at a Kwik Save store in Cheetham Hill. This experience prompted him to apply for management trainee schemes, eventually joining Marks & Spencer’s scheme in 1990. However, after two years he took a job with Ritz Video, becoming its youngest-ever area manager. The company was eventually bought by Blockbuster with Catterson working his way up to a regional director role by the time he left to join Office World as MD in 1999. He left to become MD of Phones 4u in 2001 - a position that overlapped with a senior role at Micro Peripherals. In 2006, he joined Carphone Warehouse as MD and helped improve UK retail profits by 12%. Then in January 2010, he became CEO of Expansys.

At M&S: Catterson made his mark, completing a 12-month management trainee scheme in six months. However, he decided to leave as he felt there wasn’t enough scope for people with his entrepreneurial zeal to thrive. Catterson recently told a local newspaper: “One Saturday, M&S had just launched a new range of summer dresses and by 11am they had sold out. I rang head office to find out when we could get more stock and on Monday I was hauled before the store manager and told it was not my place to do that. By the end of the meeting I had decided to leave.”

What is he doing now? Catterson joined Expansys in January 2010 as CEO worldwide. The company has evolved from being an online consumer electronics retailer specialising in smartphones and tablets to an ‘end-to-end solutions provider to MNOs, MVNOs and technology brands globally’ - in layman’s terms it specialises in e-commerce and logistics/fulfilment software.