One of Britain’s most prominent businesswomen is being lined up to chair Deliveroo, the food delivery service, as it applies the finishing touches to a blockbuster London flotation.
Sky News has learnt that Claudia Arney will join the board of Deliveroo in the run-up to what is likely to be among the City's most prominent initial public offerings of 2021.
City sources said that Ms Arney's appointment could be announced as early as Wednesday.
Her arrival on the board of Deliveroo and its prospective multibillion pound flotation will come amid a frenzy of corporate activity in the global food delivery sector, with revenues and profits fuelled by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
Ms Arney currently holds directorships at the Premier League, Ocado, Kingfisher and Derwent London, the property developer.
Her executive career included stints at the Treasury and the media groups Emap and Pearson.
Deliveroo's decision to recruit a heavyweight independent chair implies that it may seek a premium listing that would make it eligible for inclusion in London's blue-chip share indices.
Will Shu, the company's founder and chief executive, is said to be keen to ensure that the food delivery service has a robust corporate governance framework in place before it goes public.
The Deliveroo IPO will come as Lord Hill, the former EU commissioner, conducts a review of London's listings regime with the objective of attracting high-growth technology companies to the City while avoiding significant compromises on governance standards.
Sky News revealed earlier this month that Rick Medlock, a former finance chief of the payments group Worldpay, is joining Deliveroo as a non-executive director and chair of its audit committee.
In recent weeks, Deliveroo has been appointing bankers to help steer it through the biggest financial milestone since it was launched in 2013.
Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are working with the company, with other investment banks expected to be added ahead of an IPO.
The valuation that Deliveroo is expected to seek if it floats next year has yet to be determined but it will, analysts say, be "several billion pounds".
The Amazon-backed company is one of Britain's best-known technology 'unicorns' - companies worth at least $1bn.
Its efforts to secure the US-based tech behemoth as a shareholder ran onto rocky ground last year in the form of the Competition and Markets Authority, with the regulator's eventual approval partly predicated on the basis that Deliveroo might not survive without it.
Amazon's investment as part of a $575m fundraising has prompted Deliveroo to turn its attention towards further innovation in the fight against rivals Uber Eats and Just Eat Takeaway.com.
A glut of corporate activity in the sector has seen a series of mergers, while DoorDash, a US service, last week unveiled plans to go public.
A bumper flotation will provide liquidity to many of Deliveroo's longest-standing shareholders, with notable names on its investor register including the private equity firm Bridgepoint and the institutional investors Fidelity and T Rowe Price.
Funds including Accel, Hoxton Ventures and Index Ventures backed Deliveroo at an earlier stage of its existence.
Deliveroo is likely to emerge as a beneficiary of the further month-long lockdown in England as consumers turn to takeaway food services, although the COVID-19 crisis has also presented challenges as it has adapted its operations in different countries amid rapidly changing government restrictions.
The company said recently that it would donate hundreds of thousands of free meals to the NHS, repeating an initiative it launched earlier in the year.
Deliveroo had previously signalled that it would add 15,000 riders to its fleet by the end of year, and has launched a number of additional services such as on-demand convenience and grocery partnerships with Waitrose, Morrisons and the Co-op.
Deliveroo now has nearly 45,000 restaurants on its platform in the UK, and it has recently started allowing customers to reward riders after their delivery has arrived.
It has also announced the launch of a service called Brought to you by Deliveroo, which will allow customers to order food from restaurants' websites, but with the tech company fulfilling the orders' delivery.
Deliveroo's brighter prospects come amid a torrid period for many of its restaurant partners, with hospitality chiefs warning that hundreds of thousands of jobs will disappear from the sector without further state support.
Leon, the healthy fast food chain, has become the latest operator to draw up plans for an insolvency mechanism known as a company voluntary arrangement.
The return to a tiering system of restrictions is expected to deepen the pain across the sector during its busiest period of the year.
Deliveroo declined to comment on Tuesday evening.
