Peter Vardy has appointed former Skyscanner chief financial officer Colin McLellan as CFO of its group of companies, including the digital finance broker CarMoney and online retail platform provider SilverBullet.

The Glasgow-based AM100 retail group has welcomed McLellan on-board following seven  years with Skyscanner – one of Europe’s largest B2C internet businesses – which included a period as the interim chief executive of Skyscanner Japan. 

Prior to this McLellan held roles at KPMG, where he qualified as a chartered accountant, and Scottish Power.

He was also a category winner of the ICAS top accountant under 35 years old two years in a row.

Commenting on McLellan’s appointment, Peter Vardy chief executive, Peter Vardy, said “We are delighted to welcome Colin to the Peter Vardy Group, we have a bold and ambitious 10-year growth strategy and Colin’s wealth of experience in digital and acquisitions will be invaluable to us as we continue to expand.

“As we have seen recently, it is more important than ever to have strong digital capabilities within the motor industry and it’s an area we are excited to continue to develop and grow as a business.

“We wanted to look outside the motor industry and to some of the leading digital businesses when recruiting for this role, so it was a real coup for the group to recruit Colin. I’m really excited for the future of the business.”

McLellan said: “I am thrilled to be joining one of the most innovative automotive companies in the UK, I was attracted by the ambitious strategy but was completely wowed by the ‘sell to give’ culture and the opportunity to make a real difference.

“Also it couldn’t be a better fit for me as I am huge car enthusiast and was actually a customer of the business already.”

Prior to the COVID-19 lockdown, Peter Vardy’s dealer software business SilverBullet offered a free three-month trial of their online sales platform to all retailers to give them the ability to trade remotely during this period.

A week before the Government’s March 23 decision to impose a full retail lockdown in the UK as part of efforts to inhibit the spread of COVID-19 coronavirus, Peter Vardy offered a free three-month trial of his SilverBullet online trading platform to retailers across the UK, stating that life may prove “extremely difficult” for those unable to transact online in the weeks and months ahead.

In its 2018 annual financial results statement, published in September last year, Peter Vardy revealed that it expects to complete 50% of its car sales online by 2023.

Central to its plans for future retail success the company – which has invested in online retail start-up Silver Bullet – said that it intends to sell half of its vehicles online by 2023, with a target of 60% of all service bookings coming through online channels in the same year.