Sir Tom Cowie

Following the announcement today by the Cowie family Arriva’s chief executive, David Martin said: “We are extremely saddened by the news that Arriva’s founder, Sir Tom Cowie, has passed away.

“Sir Tom was a dedicated and talented businessman whose determination and vision built his small family motorcycle business, T Cowie Ltd, into a successful national motor retailing chain and laid the foundations for Arriva’s international business today.

“Following Sir Tom’s retirement from the group in 1993 he became our honorary president. Whilst this was not an active role on the board, Sir Tom remained interested in and supportive of Arriva’s successful expansion into new passenger transport markets.

“Sir Tom will be sadly missed and our thoughts are with his family.”

Sir Tom passed away on Wednesday 18 January 2012 aged 89.

Notes to editors:

• In 1938 the Cowie family opened a second-hand motorcycle shop in Sunderland.
• In 1960 the company – still called Cowie – moved into motor retailing.
• In 1980 Cowie started to purchase bus companies with the acquisition of the Grey-Green bus company in London. Over the next few years, there were more bus company acquisitions, with the biggest – British Bus Group plc – in 1996 making the business one of the largest bus operators in the UK.
• Sir Tom Cowie left the group in 1993. 
• Arriva was born in 1997, bringing together many different company backgrounds under the Arriva flag and the group acquired its first business in mainland Europe – Unibus Holdings in Denmark.
• In 1999 Arriva decided to focus its management and financial resources to enable the group to capitalise on opportunities in passenger transport in the UK and mainland Europe. In line with this the group disposed of a number of major motor retailing and finance businesses. This process was completed by the summer of 2003 and the sale of its vehicle rental division followed in 2006.
• Arriva is one of the largest providers of passenger transport in Europe, employing some 47,500 people and delivering more than 1.5 billion passenger journeys every year. 
• We provide transport services including buses, trains, commuter coaches and waterbuses, and operate in 12 European countries: Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the UK. 
• Arriva is part of Deutsche Bahn, one of the world’s leading passenger transport and logistics service providers. Headquartered in Sunderland, UK, Arriva is responsible for Deutsche Bahn's regional passenger transport services outside Germany.