Mike Creedon

Age: 65 · Location: UK · Frame: chair/exec-chair (age 65 above sweet window) · Judge tier: 1 · Judge Focus-44 rank: 6

InPractice expert: id=1616

Former CEO SDI Group plc (free since Jan-2024, zero directorships)
_Company: None; former SDI Group plc._

Free since January 2024 with ZERO active directorships. Deliberate open-market behaviour (not NED-drift). Insite classifies as data_score 1.0 / status complete and fully-named in the InPractice register — the only Focus-44 candidate who is also an InPractice quotable named expert, giving a live warm route via InPractice research desk on top of any Ken-Ford reference-first pass.

Built SDI Group plc from £10m to £68m revenue and £12.8m operating profit with 17 decentralised bolt-ons of ~£1m-EBIT businesses at ~5.5x — the UK plc analogue to Judges / Lifco.

SDI Group £10m → £68m revenue with 17 decentralised bolt-ons of ~£1m-EBIT businesses at ~5.5x — UK plc analogue to Judges/Lifco. Free since Jan-2024 with zero directorships.

ACCA + Henley MBA; 3 AIM/NASDAQ FD roles pre-SDI (Innovision/Leitch, Ninth Floor, Ideal Shopping Direct); concurrent CEO+FD 2012-2018 (Lin 44-walk). Ken Ford = Eric Kenelm Ford, 14yr SDI Chair, ex-CEO Teather & Greenwood, NED Hybridan LLP — HIGH warm-intro reference-first-then-Creedon sequence. Also an InPractice named expert (expert_id=1616) — dual warm route.

INSITE expert_id=1616 named in medtech-expert-register.md: "spends his time predominantly visiting subsidiaries and buying new companies" — SDI operator-mode signature. ONLY Focus 44 candidate who is ALSO an InPractice quotable named expert = dual warm route on top of Ken Ford reference-first.

CEO SDI Group plc, 17+ years total. Joined SDI as CFO during a two-profit-warning turnaround at ~£2.5m market cap; became CEO; grew market cap £2.5m → £170m. Concurrent CEO+FD 2012-2018 (Lin 44-walk). Accountant by training (ACCA + Henley MBA); pulls in engineers for technical due diligence. Prior to SDI: three AIM / NASDAQ FD roles (Innovision/Leitch, Ninth Floor, Ideal Shopping Direct).

• 17 acquisitions, decentralised, ~£1m-EBIT businesses at ~5.5× PBT entry (never haggles).
• Leverage 1.5× EBITDA vs 2.5× covenants — deliberately unleveraged.
• No formal ROIC / IRR target — organic-growth test is what he screens for.
• ROCE 20-25% on acquisitions ex-property.
• Software-averse — won't buy software because DD can't reveal bugs.
• Same two law firms (Mills & Reeve OR Birketts) for all 15 acquisitions.
• Single-person capital-allocator — 4 days a week visiting subsidiaries. Uses his own bonus to buy out his share options — insider-buyer signal.
• Structural guardrail he stated himself: "When I decide I can't get around all the businesses in four to six weeks, or we've got six or seven deals on the go" — the point at which SDI would adopt a Halma-style sector layer. This is the coming-up-the-curve tell — the point at which Creedon might need help or handover.

"Leave these businesses to run themselves. We're there to invest in them; we're an investment vehicle." — Buffett-invocation. [ev 2438]

"If I got run over by a bus, they'd be fine." — Radical decentralisation. [ev 2413]

"[Time to add a sector layer is] when I decide I can't get around all the businesses in four to six weeks, or we've got six or seven deals on the go." — The scale-limit he named himself. [ev 2459]

AVAILABLE_NOW

Outreach window: APPROACH NOW (reference-first via Ken Ford)

AVAILABLE_NOW. Free since Jan-2024, zero directorships, deliberate open-market behaviour. Judge's Focus-44 v2 file notes L6 evidence-only rescore: age 65 no longer mechanically scored; the absence of concurrent boards + freshness of the exit are the signal.

Eric Kenelm Ford (14yr SDI Chair, warm-intro trust=1.0) for reference-first pass; also Stephen Brown SDI

• Eric Kenelm 'Ken' Ford — 14-year SDI Chair, ex-CEO Teather & Greenwood, NED Hybridan LLP. Warm-intro trust 1.0 per Judge — the reference-first-then-Creedon anchor. ⚠ Late signal 2026-09-16: Lin's Fork alpha scrape found no Costigan–Ford co-mention on which that route rests, and Talent recommended dropping the Ken-Ford ref-route (msg-1789588768098-brd5vd); better-anchored ref-first alternatives are Shakesheff or Roy Davis.
• InPractice research desk — bookable named-expert interview (Creedon = expert 1616). Dual warm route on top of Ken Ford.
• Peter Astles — technical-DD partner named repeatedly in Creedon's own InPractice interview (~15+ years). Engineer by training; Astles Control Systems is an SDI subsidiary. "Founder-engineer who's been through 15 SDI-model DDs" — value beyond the Creedon introduction alone.
• Ami (current SDI CFO, ex-Ultra Electronics) — Creedon's key-man-risk mitigator on M&A. Sector-layer-preparation-for-scale hire.
• David Cicurel (Judges Scientific) — peer capital-allocator, corpus-attested. Both single-person capital-allocators, both buy manufacturing sites at 4-6× PBT.

chair/exec-chair (age 65 above sweet window) · Judges Scientific / Lifco (UK plc analogue) · L4 bracket DEEP · L1=5 L2=4 L4=5 L5=5 L6=5

Path to seat: plc_serial_acquirer_ceo

"Spends his time predominantly visiting subsidiaries and buying new companies" — SDI operator-mode signature, from the InPractice register verbatim. Manufacturing-only bias (contrasts Constellation's vertical-market-software focus). Single-person capital-allocator (Cicurel/Judges alongside; opposite Halma's sector-team model).

• Not currently in InPractice: Ken Ford (probe interview-willingness); the RM at HSBC (lent SDI £20m + £10m accordion); Danske Bank owns 5%. Ecosystem contacts, lower priority than the operators + law firms.
• The scale-limit Creedon named himself is the specific hook: "you named the point at which the model needs help — I want to talk about what that looks like."

Data gap: SDI profit-warning departure — Andvari analyst attributes to industry-cycle destocking not idiosyncratic (softens concern)

Data gap: L6 revised: age 65 no longer mechanically scored; free since Jan-2024 + zero directorships = deliberate open-market behaviour.

Data gap: L6 evidence-only rescore: Free since Jan-2024 with ZERO active directorships = deliberate open-market behaviour; not NED-drift