Guy Hornsby has a long career in media and the arts. He’s been a Radio Producer and Presenter, TV Presenter and Announcer, Programme Controller, Managing Director and Chief Executive. In the arts he’s run a major London Arts Venue for more than 16 years and he owns a web hosting and design company, I T Computer Systems, which specialises in creating bespoke online websites for the arts, entertainment and retail sectors.
Guy has most recently been a Trustee and Director of Riverside Trust, the arts charity that redeveloped and opened the new Riverside Studios in Hammersmith. Previously he was a member of the senior executive, having been Executive Director between 2006 and 2020, and then Business & Finance Director / Joint Chief Executive Officer (CEO) during the last six months of 2020 and all of 2021.
Theatre spaces at Riverside have a reputation for staging a wide range of international theatre, dance, music and comedy whilst Riverside's cinema is one of London's leading independent screens. Guy created and co-programmed the highly regarded Deep Desires & Broken Dreams annual film season that ran for 5 years in the cinema and with Riverside TV staged well known TV programmes like Top of the Pops, The Last Leg and The Apprentice: You’re Fired. Since its redevelopment the studios have been home to Have I Got News For You, Richard Osman’s House of Games and Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two.
In 2014 Guy was appointed Project Director of a five year £48M redevelopment of Riverside Studios with responsibility for providing new theatre and rehearsal facilities, cinema & screening room, broadcast television studios, community resources, two restaurants, three bars and a range of public spaces. The project was successfully completed under its final budget by more than half a million pounds, in November 2019.
Guy is one of the founder partners and directors of IT Computer Systems Limited. He is a specialist in website construction and pioneered the use of new technologies in both satellite and wireless broadband as well as mobile telephone publishing. His media consultancy group continues to be engaged by a broad range of high profile clients in the Live Entertainment, Radio, Television and Internet industries.
For nearly 5 years Guy Hornsby was Managing Director and then Chief Executive of Faze FM Radio, which owned and operated Kiss 102 in Manchester and Kiss 105 in Yorkshire. Under Guy's leadership both these youth market radio stations achieved an enviable reputation for combining programme excellence with business success. Guy set up both stations from scratch initially employing just 17 staff expanding to over 120 individuals working full and part time in programming, sales, marketing, administration, corporate finance and engineering.
Following approaches by most of the country's key media players, Faze FM was purchased by the Chrysalis Group for £17.6m just over four years after the company had been founded with an initial investment of £600k. Before joining Faze FM, Guy was Group Programme Controller of the Southern Radio Group, responsible for the output of all the Ocean, Southern and Invicta FM and AM stations. Now part of the Global Radio Group, Guy was a senior member of the launch team who founded Ocean Sound in 1986, was the station's first voice on-air and its original breakfast show presenter. He also hosted the station's legendary 4-hour dance music radio show The Saturday Soul Club.
Guy began his radio career at the BBC as an Arts Reporter on BBC Radio London's Look, Stop, Listen presented by Mike Sparrow. Three years later as producer in charge of The Tony Blackburn Show he transformed the programme into one of the most talked about radio shows in the capital. The combination of soul and dance music, together with its risque style of presentation, brought the station huge success. Guy was one of the team that invented the Radio London Soul Night Out which attracted to the bill superstars like Stevie Wonder, Edwin Starr and Alexander O'Neal. Soon after, he was asked by the BBC World Service to produce a seventeen-part documentary series on the origins of soul and dance music, called Sweet Soul Music. The series, presented by Tony Myatt, was broadcast around the world on three different occasions and won an International Radio Award.
Before joining the broadcasting industry, Guy was a computer programmer for Honda UK, and with the knowledge he gained, he pioneered the use of computer and digital technology in the radio industry. The Faze FM stations led the field in their use of computers in radio programming with much of the output automated. The consequent significant cost savings, together with extremely high sales and marketing revenues, led to early operating profits. Kiss 102 in Manchester was the first commercial radio station in the UK to have its own website.
Guy Hornsby has been featured on a number of high profile TV and radio programmes. The BBC's Newsnight described him as one of the UK's new breed of entrepreneurs who possess the business expertise essential for a successful new media start-up. For more than 25 years Debrett's listed Guy's interests in New Technology, Arts and Sport as well as his achievements in Media and Broadcasting. Guy is married and has a home in West London, UK and Haarlem, The Netherlands.
