David Alliance, Baron Alliance

The Right Honourable
The Lord Alliance
CBE
Lord Temporal
Assumed office
13 September 2004
Personal details
Born Davoud Alliance
(1932-06-15) 15 June 1932
Kashan, Iran
Nationality British
Political party Liberal Democrats
Spouse(s) Alma Joseph
Homa Alliance (m. 1982)
Relations Nigel Alliance OBE
Children 2 sons, 1 daughter
Occupation Non-Executive Chairman,
N Brown Group
Net worth Increase £3.1 billion (2015)[1][2]

David Alliance, Baron Alliance, CBE (Persian: داوود آلیانس‎‎,[3] Hebrew: דייוויד אליאנס‎‎; born 15 June 1932) is an Iranian-British businessman and Liberal Democrat politician of Jewish origin from Iran.

Personal

David Alliance (originally Davoud) was born in Kashan, Iran and was educated at the Etahad School, Iran. He began his career in the bazaars of Iran at the age of fourteen and by the age of eighteen moved to Manchester, England. He has three children and five grandchildren, and now lives in Manchester and London.

Peerage

Alliance was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1984 New Year Honours[4] and in the 1989 New Year Honours[5] received a knighthood, the honour being bestowed 9 February 1989.[6] He was created a life peer as Baron Alliance, of Manchester in the County of Greater Manchester on 1 July 2004[7] and sits on the Liberal Democrat benches.

Career

He owns 33% and is chairman of N Brown Group plc, a clothing catalogue retailer. He was also the joint founder with Sir Harry Djanogly of Coats Viyella plc (now Coats plc) operating in 67 countries with 22% global market share, employing 70,000 people. Share sales, a valuable art collection and some small private firms account for the remainder of the family fortune. Lord Alliance, with Harry Djanogly, turned Coats Viyella into a £2bn textile business. David Alliance is also one of the primary investors of the web measurement company SimilarWeb.[8]

Lord Alliance serves on a number of committees including the Prince’s Youth Business Trust, Council for Industry and Higher Education, and the University of Manchester Foundation, and the Weizmann Institute. He is senior trustee of the Next Century Foundation. He serves on the Board of Governors of Tel Aviv University in Tel Aviv, Israel.[9] He has a number of fellowships including Fellow of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures & Commerce; Fellow of the City and Guilds of London Institute; and Hon. Fellow of the Shenkar College of Textile Technology and Fashion. Lord Alliance holds a Doctorate of Science at Heriot-Watt University and Legum Doctor (Doctor of Laws Honoris Causa) from the University of Manchester. He used to be an Honorary Fellow of UMIST as there is no UMIST anymore after the merger.

Alliance received an Honorary Doctorate from Heriot-Watt University in 1991 [10]

Wealth

In the Sunday Times Rich List 2015 ranking of the wealthiest people in the UK he was placed with an estimated fortune of £3.1 billion.[11] Since his elevation to the peerage in 2004, he has given the Liberal Democrats £668,872 in donations, plus an additional £20,996.56 in notional interest on loans he has made to the party.[12]

Lord Alliance owns a home in Didsbury, Manchester and a mock Georgian mansion in St Johns Wood, an affluent area of north west London. He also owns a collection of Lowry paintings.[13]

In 2012, Tel Aviv University established an Iranian Studies Center, named after Lord Alliance.[14]

In September 2015 Manchester Business School was renamed in Alliance Manchester Business School (AMBS) in honour of Alliance, who has had a long-standing association with the school and wider university. AMBS'S head, Fiona Devine, said that "The donation made by Lord Alliance and the Alliance Family Foundation will support the biggest transformation the school has seen since it was established some 50 years ago."[15]

Alliance's autobiography, A Bazaar Life (co-written with Ivan Fallon) was published in 2015.[16]

References

  1. ↑ "Revealed: A rich list of former apprentices - Manchester Evening News". manchestereveningnews.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  2. ↑ "Alliance Becomes Billionaire Selling Plus-Size Clothing - Bloomberg Business". bloomberg.com. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  3. ↑ "BBC Persian". bbc.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  4. ↑ The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 49583. p. 8. 31 December 1983.
  5. ↑ The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 51578. p. 1. 30 December 1988.
  6. ↑ The London Gazette: no. 51720. p. 5227. 2 May 1989.
  7. ↑ The London Gazette: no. 57346. p. 8399. 6 July 2004.
  8. ↑ Reuters Editorial. "SimilarWeb unifies mapping of mobile and computer Web | Reuters". reuters.com. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  9. ↑ "Tel Aviv University Governors Roll | Tel Aviv University". english.tau.ac.il. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  10. ↑ webperson@hw.ac.uk. "Heriot-Watt University Edinburgh: Honorary Graduates". www1.hw.ac.uk. Retrieved 2016-04-04.
  11. ↑ "Sunday Times Rich List 2009". timesonline.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  12. ↑ Electoral Commission register of donors – http://registers.electoralcommission.org.uk/regulatory-issues/regdpoliticalparties.cfm?ec={ts%20'06 February 2011%2005:08:14'}
  13. ↑ "12. Lord David Alliance: £226m (£216m) - Manchester Evening News". manchestereveningnews.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  14. ↑ "מרכז אליאנס ללימודים איראניים - Page2RSS". page2rss.com. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  15. ↑ "Manchester Business School renamed following £15m donation from Lord Alliance - Manchester Evening News". manchestereveningnews.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2016.
  16. ↑ David Alliance; Ivan Fallon; Peter Mandelson (5 February 2015). A Bazaar Life: The Autobiography of David Alliance. Biteback Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84954-878-6.
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