Steve Coultate
VP and General Manager
EMEA Boat Business Unit
Steve joined Sealine in May 2006. With over 25 years experience in manufacturing industry, he began as an apprentice at the age of 17. Gaining a degree in Mechanical Engineering and later an MBA, he took positions of increasing seniority through Production Control, IT, Quality Control, Design, Product Launch, and Lean Manufacturing. He was a member of the leadership team responsible for transforming the Halewood plant on Merseyside from a Ford to a Jaguar plant - and now rated by JD Power as one of the world’s top quality automotive plants. After 16 years at Jaguar, Steve moved to Land Rover as Manufacturing Director in 2002. Five new models were launched in a three and a half year period resulting in the strongest model line-up in Land Rover’s history.
In moving to Sealine, Steve saw the opportunity for taking ultimate responsibility for another great British brand. His initial focus has been to develop an outstanding team – combining the marine strengths within Sealine with some of the best talent from outside. The team have accelerated Product Development – most recently launching the award-winning SC35 and revealing the SC47 and F46. The company is also expanding its international presence, and introducing the latest manufacturing techniques to its boat building operations.
Steve comments: "I have been delighted with how the team has developed: we have assembled a very dynamic, high calibre group of people with a real passion for this business. They are demonstrating what fresh thinking can do for a business: our agenda is geared to our customers – and delivering great products is at the heart of this strategy. The Boat of the Year Award for the SC35 is a testament to the team’s abilities."
Rob Bonham
Finance Director and Sealine Acting Managing Director
Rob joined Sealine at the start of 2007 having formerly been a Financial Controller in a large division of the Anglo-Dutch steel manufacturer Corus plc and a Finance Director at one of the printing factories in the Polestar Group, the largest independent printer in the UK.
Rob is a qualified Chartered Accountant (ACA) having trained with KPMG in Birmingham and passed his final exams back in 1994. He also holds a BSc degree in Geography from Durham University.
In his spare time Rob plays hockey and cricket with a passion and fills the rest of his time passing on his love of sport to his children.
Nicholas Turner
Marketing & Sales Director
Nicholas has built a successful track record in sales and marketing, most recently working in the automotive sector as Marketing Director for one of the UK’s largest retail dealer groups, the Camden Motor Group. Prior to that, Nicholas spent 10 years with international data management firm Acxiom providing CRM and customer-facing marketing solutions for the automotive, travel and financial service sectors.
Nicholas has a lifelong leisure interest in sailing and motor boating and keeps his own boat near his home on the River Thames. In addition, he is qualified to Yachtmaster Offshore level to formally confirm his boat handling skills.
The combination of Nicholas’ sales, marketing and maritime skills, together with his knowledge of the motor yacht market, should prove a powerful force in developing Sealine’s marketing activity and strengthening distribution channels. Nicholas currently lives in Richmond, Surrey and he completed his bachelor’s degree in Business Studies at the London Guildhall University.
Carsten Astheimer
Design Director
Carsten graduated with a BSc honours degree in both Mechanical Engineering from Leicester University and Transportation Design from Art Center College of Design Pasadena.
After a work experience with the Volkswagen/Audi Design center in California, his professional career has been nurtured in the Design Rich region of Northern Italy.
The first four years were with Idea Institute Turin, working mostly on car design projects for the likes of Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Lamborghini, Lotus, Kia and Honda. After which he opened his own studio Inovo design, a studio which is still going strong, which was the number one design supplier for the Fiat group.
And finally for seven years with Pininfarina, managing the Design studio Pininfarina Extra responsible for all non automotive products from boats and planes to cell phones and sports equipment.
Here he followed more than three hundred successful projects into production for world leading clients being acclaimed many design awards along the way, including:
Three red dot design awards for projects with Samsung, 3M and a Design team award, two Good Design Awards by the Museum of Architecture and Design of Chicago and several nominations for the gold compass award. He helped set up a design studio for the Motorola IDEn technology group in Florida, and has made ground breaking projects for the likes for Lange ski boots, Jacuzzi, Snaidero kitchens, and Ray Ban. A highlight of this time was the Olympic torch project and the caldron for Torino 2006 which has become a characteristic feature of the town of Turin.
Carsten, hired by the Brunswick Boat group, joined Sealine as Design Director in October 2006 and has relished the opportunity in creating a new Design Direction, now evident in the SC35, the SC47, the F46 and soon to be seen in the new F42.
David Stretton
Manufacturing Director
David joined Sealine in August 2008 and brings with him over 30 years of Manufacturing and Operations experience from a variety of business sectors including Defence, Commercial Vehicles, Construction and Automotive. He started his career as an apprentice welder at Alvis Vehicles in Coventry and during his time there held a variety of manufacturing positions and gained an MBA. After spending 4 years at Dennis Eagle (manufacturers of refuse vehicles) based in Warwick, David moved into general management as Managing Director within Boalloy Industries responsible for M+G trailers based in Stourbridge. Later joining King Trailers based in Market Harborough as Operations Director.
More recently David relocated his family to Yorkshire joining GB Industries as Manufacturing Director specializing in manufacturing large capital goods projects for the construction and oil industry.
David’s major successes have mainly come from transforming the manufacturing operations of a business focusing on quality, delivery on time, efficiency and safety. A challenge that welcomed him to Sealine and the ultimate attraction that brought David and his family back to the Midlands.
Mark Turner
Supply Chain Director
Mark’s career began in the automotive industry in the West Midlands, with a role at Thyssen – a first tier supplier to Toyota, Jaguar and GM for cast and machined aluminium parts. Within the first year of joining the company, he became Chief Buyer and progressed to Purchasing Manager. After spending 9 years with Thyssen, Mark moved on to a number of positions focusing on supply chain systems development, strategic sourcing and new programme introduction.
Prior to joining Sealine, Mark moved into the aerospace industry working for Goodrich – a company that designs and manufactures actuation systems for civil and military aircraft. As Supply Chain Manager, Mark worked in divisions in Coventry, Wolverhampton and even spent a few months in France. Shortly after moving to Goodrich, Mark completed an MBA.
His role at Sealine is to transform the supply side of the business, including the development of materials requirement systems to ensure purchased parts are available at the time they are needed, to target cost.
Mark is married and lives near Birmingham
Nick Swift
Product Development and Engineering Director
Nick has extensive experience in engineering design and development and has been involved in the delivery of numerous projects from concept to production. Possessing an honours degree in Mechanical Engineering and Chartered Engineer status, Nick has worked for the last 20 years in the truck and construction machinery manufacturing industries managing R&D, Design and Development teams. He has worked with well-known British brands including Foden Trucks, JCB and Dennis Eagle.
Joining Sealine in October of 2007, Nick sees the opportunity of working with another famous British brand as an exciting challenge and looks forward to transferring the skills he has honed in his career to another product range.
Nick is married with a son and a daughter and in his spare time enjoys watching football, DIY and is currently building his own kit car.
Warren McCafferty
Group Quality Manager
From Ayrshire on the West Coast of Scotland, where he worked in the electronics industry for 20 yrs supplying printed circuit boards to a variety of sectors including personal computers, telecoms, military, aerospace, marine and automotive. He started his career as a chemical engineer and latterly completed an MBA. His career experience during this time included senior roles in process engineering management, cad/cam, lean manufacturing management, customer service, sales management and quality management.
In 2003 he decided to change careers to seek a new challenge and joined an American company supplying interiors to the automotive market. Based in Warrington, Coventry and Hungary the primary products were leather seating supplying Mercedes, Landrover, Ford, Opel, Honda, Nissan and Renault.
During his time there as the Group Quality Manager he was responsible for implementing the automotive quality standard ISO TS 16949 based on ISO 9001 and led continuous improvement activities using a variety of quality tools such as SPC and structured problem solving, as well as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma methodologies.
Having now joined Sealine he will assist in the organisations transformation of the quality systems and processes being used leading to improved boat building quality and reliability in line with the overall strategy of the company.
Matt Cherry
European Vice President - Human Resources
Matt joined Sealine in 2004 and has 15 years experience in human resource management in the UK manufacturing sector.
After completing a Business Studies degree, then a Masters in Personnel Management at the London School of Economics, Matt moved to the West Midlands to join British Steel (now Corus Group) where he undertook a number of general HR management roles.
Within Sealine, Matt is responsible for the development of fit for purpose people management and development activity that maximises the contribution of Sealine personnel. He particularly focuses on enhancing career development opportunities, promoting investment in training to improve skill levels, increasing job satisfaction and improving internal communications to boost overall productivity and business performance.
Matt is married with two young children and lives in Shropshire. As well as spending time with the family he enjoys playing and watching a range of sports, swimming and exercising at a local gym.