Richard is the driving force behind the strategic direction of the company, whose vision is to create huge, long-lasting social and economic change for communities and sustainable value for shareholders.

Richard is a creative entrepreneur and patron of the arts, who is passionate about quality of place, architecture, heritage and provenance. A keen proponent of sensitive regeneration, in 2014 he fought and co-funded the campaign to save Smithfield Market in London from demolition. In 2018 the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport appointed Richard as a Commissioner for Historic England.

Richard co-founded Cathedral Group PLC in 1998 and nurtured the company to become a market-leader in public-private partnership developments, building a pipeline of over £2bn. In May 2014, Cathedral merged with Development Securities, which ultimately became U+I in November 2015. U+I is a FTSE listed public company with a development pipeline of £10.5 billion.