Ray is a Partner in PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Corporate Finance. Ray leads the Local Government and Social Infrastructure team focusing on advising public and private sector clients on the financing, procurement, delivery and economic impact of projects and investment programmes in regeneration, housing, economic development and education. He is also a board member of PwC’s national Communities and Local Government team.
Ray has many years experience in regeneration and economic development and has a particular focus on the development of public private partnerships (PPPs) in the area of regeneration. He is currently leading advisory teams on a number of groundbreaking PPP initiatives in urban regeneration projects across the UK and was involved in the development of the Local Asset Backed Vehicle regeneration financing approach. Ray has considerable experience in raising finance and is leading a PwC team aiming to develop new funding solutions to support growth and regeneration including the financing of enabling infrastructure. He is currently working on a number of innovative local finance initiatives including the Barnet Bond and with the Core Cities group on Accelerated Development Zones. He also led PwC’s input into the Centre for Cities ‘City Solutions’ programme which contributed to the recent UK government policy announcement on the introduction of Business Rate Supplement.
In addition to his work in regeneration Ray has substantial experience of developing strategies for the commercialisation of intellectual property. He led the team responsible for evaluating the Scottish Enterprise Proof of Concept Fund and is currently working with the same organisation to evaluate the Kelvin Institute and the Edinburgh Stanford Link. Ray has also advised a number of start-up businesses to secure venture capital funding including Pure Wafer plc, Welsh Company of the Year 2006.
Outside PwC Ray was until recently a non-executive director of the board of Creative Sheffield, one of the first city development companies, established to drive forward the economic transformation of the city. He is also a visiting professor at Newcastle University’s Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies.
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