Ulster Bank chief to head Williams & Glyn

The chief executive of Ulster Bank is to be appointed head of Williams & Glyn as the "challenger" prepares to float on the stock market nearly three years after it was originally due to be sold.

Jim Brown will join the new bank, which is being carved out of Royal Bank of Scotland, as chief executive as soon as a replacement to lead Ulster has been appointed.

John Maltby, a former head at Lloyds Banking Group who currently serves as chief executive of Williams & Glyn, will step down after only 18 months in the role.

Mr Maltby will resume his position as an adviser to the bank's consortium of external investors, who funded a £600m bond issued in 2013 to support the creation of the small business-focused bank.

Ross McEwan, chief executive of RBS, said: "Much has already been done in building a standalone business and we are grateful for the important role that John has played in getting the bank to this point."

He said that Mr Brown brings "a wealth of experience in retail and commercial banking" and will "lead the business" forward towards an IPO in the second half of 2016.

The new lender, which will be based on 314 branches in the UK under the revived Williams & Glyn brand, is being created as a condition of RBS's £45bn bailout during the financial crisis.

RBS had planned to sell the carved-out branch network to Santander in 2012. However, the deal fell through largely because of technology integration costs and complexities.

As a result, RBS missed the December 2013 deadline, but was given until next year to float and the end of 2017 to fully divest under an agreement between the Treasury and European Commission.

But RBS has come under criticism for not divesting the new challenger bank more quickly.

Vince Cable, the business secretary, wrote a letter last year to Mr McEwan demanding that the state-backed lender speed up the process of launching W & G.

The creation of a new bank is part of a broader push to improve competition in business banking and extend lending to small and medium-sized enterprises.

The Competition and Markets Authority last year unveiled a full-blown inquiry into the lack of transparency and choice in the business banking sector.

Labour has also pledged to create two new challenger banks from Britain's largest lenders, although people familiar with the situation said these will probably comprise W & G and TSB, the latter of which was carved out of Lloyds.

TSB floated on the London stock market in June last year, but has already agreed a takeover approach from Spanish lender Banco Sabadell, in a cash offer of 340p per share that values the bank at £1.7bn.

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