The Directors
Jonathan Power, Group CEO
Jonathan has spent nearly 20 years in finance, business development and operational roles, mainly within consumer and retail businessesStarting his financial training at Nestle he later became European Finance Director for the Merrell and Saucony footwear brands and was more recently heading up the Finance team at Hotter Shoes. He has overseen strategy development, international expansion, transformational change, financial restructuring and refinancing activities.
Bharti Patel, Managing Director
Bharti has over 25 years experience within the private and public healthcare sectors, having held executive leadership positions in pharmaceutical wholesaling, retail pharmacy, homecare and global medtech. She has particular expertise in value creation through strategic leadership, innovation, nurturing collaborative partnerships and building high performance teams.Bharti is a highly successful executive with a proven track record of developing strategic relationships and partnerships, delivering high value sales, profitability and innovation across all aspects of the healthcare sector. Experienced in public and private sector customer proposition and strategy development, sales and marketing, global procurement, supply chain, category management, product development and sourcing, RFP and tenders, contracting and new business implementation. Bharti is widely recognised in the industry with an excellent reputation for delivering results, particularly during difficult trading cycles through strong leadership, versatility, business process improvement, strategic innovation and a global mindset.
Nick Clark, Chief Operating Officer
Across 25 years in retail pharmacy Nick has held many senior and board level positions with Lloydspharmacy including UK Retail Operations Director, Head of Central Operations and Regional Director.In this time he set up a transformation function to lead the organisation through a period of significant change.
Nick has extensive experience in creating, implementing and overseeing performance improvement strategies that have delivered significant value to the brand, pharmacy mangers and the local community
David Gilder, Chief Commercial Officer
David is our Chief Commercial Officer. He has over 25 years of experience in all commercial aspects of retail pharmacy specialising in acquisition, business development and regulatory affairs.He was the Commercial Manager for Lloyds Chemists PLC, in charge of business development prior to joining Sainsbury’s in 1997 where he oversaw the chain grow from a modest 7 pharmacies to 277.
In addition, David also has experience working with GP medical providers and NHS Foundation Trusts.
Brij Valla, Sales and Purchasing Director
Brij is our Retail Sales and Purchasing Director and is responsible for procurement, sales, marketing, training and services. He has over 15 years experience in the pharmacy industry.
Rupen Sedani, Clinical Superintendent
Rupen is our Retail Clinical Superintendent. From his 25 years' experience of managing the clinical aspects of both community and hospital pharmacy, Rupen possesses extensive knowledge of professional, regulatory and clinical governance for the industry.
Richard Smith, Group Chairman
Richard is our Group Chairman. Richard also holds Chairman roles at both Affidea BV and Roderick’s Ltd, a leading UK dental chain. Richard was formerly CEO of Integrated Dental Holdings, the world’s largest operator of dental practices; and prior to that Managing Director of Lloyds pharmacy.
Salim Jetha FFRPS FRPharmS, Avicenna Chairman
With over 40 years experience in pharmacy Salim is Avicenna's Chairman. He was one of the founding directors of the business and has previously held the position of CEO.Salim has many other business interests and owns a busy high street pharmacy in which he still works one day a week. He has undertaken a management course at Imperial College, London and has an intermediate level qualification in professional accountancy. He was honoured a Fellow of Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) in 2012 followed by Faculty Fellow of RPS. He was awarded the Editor’s Award by Pharmacy Business in recognition of his achievements with Avicenna. He has been on many judging panels for industry awards and is still an active member of his Local LPC. Charity work is another interest and he has organised large charitable walks for Great Ormond Street Hospital and Cancer Research. In his spare time Salim likes to Ski with his family in the Alps.
