Telent Ltd, a leading UK technology and network services company, has appointed former Balfour Beatty MD Paul Lester CBE as a non-executive director and chairman.

As well as leading Balfour, Mr Lester (pictured right) was also a non-executive chairman of John Laing Infrastructure.

He joined the Telent Board on 2 September 2022, succeeding David Naylor-Leyland who is stepping down as chairman after 12 years. Mr Naylor-Leyland will continue as a non-executive director.

Mr Lester has over 30 years of managing companies, divisions of large multi-national companies, and chairing public, private, and private equity-backed businesses.

He is also currently chairman of McCarthy & Stone plc, Essentra PLC and Funeral Partners Ltd.

Mr Lester said: 'I am delighted to be joining the Board of Telent and am looking forward to helping the rest of the team achieve their exciting strategy.'

Jo Gretton, chief executive officer, added: 'I would like to thank David for his role as Chairman and look forward to his continued support as a Non-Executive Director. I'm also delighted that Paul has agreed to Chair our Board through our next phase of growth and look forward to working with him.'

Mr Naylor-Leyland said: 'It's been a privilege to act as Chairman since 2010, during which time Telent has achieved considerable success as a provider of mission critical technology solutions and importantly we were able to take the GEC Pension Fund to Buy.'