Geoffrey Owen


Sir Geoffrey Owen is an English academic and journalist, who is the former editor of the Financial Times. Owen is Senior Fellow at the Department of Management at the London School of Economics, where he conducts teaching and research in the field of corporate strategy, corporate governance and international competition. He is also Head of Industrial Policy at Policy Exchange, the UK's leading Think Tank.

Early life

Geoffrey Owen is the son of L. G. Owen and the tennis player Violet Owen.
Owen was educated at the Dragon School, Rugby School and Balliol College, Oxford University. He served in the Royal Air Force for two years as part of the national service.

Career

He joined the Financial Times as a feature writer in 1958. He held several posts on that paper, including those of industrial correspondent, industrial editor, and US correspondent based in New York. Between 1968 and 1973, he left journalism, serving first as an executive in the Industrial Reorganisation Corporation and then as personnel director in the overseas division of British Leyland Motor Corporation. He was deputy editor of the Financial Times from 1973 to 1980 and editor from 1981 to 1990. He was knighted in 1989.
He was a non-executive director of Laird Group plc from 2001 to the end of 2006. He is chairman of the Wincott Foundation.

Personal life

He is married to literary editor Miriam Gross.