Martyn Lewis CBE

Occupation: Author, Journalist, Presenter, Businessman

Services: Host (Awards, Debates, Conferences), After Dinner Speaker

Over 32 years, Martyn Lewis built up a considerable reputation as one of Britain's best-known TV anchormen before deciding to take up a business career, as Chairman of "Teliris", the company he co-founded with British and American partners after leaving the BBC. Teliris has become the global leader in "Interactive Telepresence" - a new "Being There" technology system which is rapidly taking over from video-conferencing. This revolutionary " next generation " communications technology has a rapidly growing list of blue-chip clients from the worlds of banking, telecoms, pharmaceuticals, publishing, finance and film-making.

Martyn dovetails his entrepreneurial role as Chairman of Teliris with his many Corporate Conference presenting and Speaking engagements. It is the unique combination of Martyn's success and experience in both media and corporate worlds, his business acumen, his debating, interviewing and presentational skills, which have all won Martyn regular contracts presenting conferences around the globe for major national and international blue chip organizations.

Whilst Martyn still finds time to make regular appearances on our television screens in discussion programmes such as ITV's 'Ultimate Questions', most company executives in Britain have grown up with his news anchoring. Over 20 years he presented first ITN's News At Ten, then the BBC's One O'Clock, Six O'Clock and Nine O'Clock News. He has also co-presented General Election and Budget programmes, and been presenter of the primetime BBC documentary series "Crimebeat", the daily news quiz "Today's The Day".

The six books he has authored include REFLECTIONS ON SUCCESS, for which he interviewed 67 prominent achievers from many walks of life - ranging from Tony O'Reilly and Shimon Peres to Michael Palin and Billy Connolly, from Tony Blair and F.W.de Klerk to Sir Anthony Hopkins, Judy Dench and Lynford Christie. Martyn summarises key parts of the book in a highly motivational speech which goes down well at corporate conferences. The book has been bought by companies such as Peugeot and Accenture to give to their senior staff after conferences which Martyn has presented for them.

Charity work takes up a large part of Martyn's spare time, he is Chair of the Queens' Award for Voluntary Service Main Awards Committee and is a familiar after-dinner speaker at Hospice fund-raising functions across the country.  Martyn curently presents his own show on AGE UK's own radio station The Wireless.

Martyn is also Chairman for YouthNet UK, a charity he founded in 1995 to create a comprehensive internet site signposting young people to every conceivable opportunity or form of help they might need ( www.thesite.org ). Praised publicly by both the Prime Minister and the Chancellor, it has a staff of 35, a budget of over £3 million a year, and is accessed by over half a million young people a month. YouthNet has also created www.do-it.org , the national volunteering database, with over 600,000 regularly updated volunteering opportunities on line.

In 1994, Martyn made the news himself with two controversial and widely-debated speeches arguing for a shift in the agenda of TV news programmes to achieve a fairer balance between the positive and the negative, and report and analyse achievement just as much as failure. He still debates these very same issues in forums around the world.

Richard Lindley's recent book on the history of ITN describes Martyn Lewis as "simply one of the best news story film-makers ITN ever employed". He now brings that experience to the corporate sector as Chairman of NICE TV, which provides bespoke TV news programmes for major conferences.

Martyn was awarded a CBE in the 1997 New Year Honours List.

Clips

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Contacts

Corporate, Television & Radio - Joscelyn Henton