We are pleased to welcome four new members to the Johnian Society Committee. Sir Graham Wrigley (1982) will be joining as the new Vice-President, and Yijing Li (2008), Ian Roberts (1975) and Steven Rosenhek (1984) will become committee members.
A few members will be changing positions this year: Fiona McIlwham (1992) will be changing from Vice-President to President and Anthony Freeling (1975) will become the Past President. The Committee also says goodbye to Nigel Topping (1985), latterly Chair, and we thank him for his contribution to the Committee.
Sir Graham Wrigley (1982)
Graham came to St John’s College in 1982 to read Economics and Law, before starting his business career with Bain. He went on to become a founding partner of Permira and served on its management team as it grew to a leading global private equity firm. In 2006, he stepped away from private equity to pursue a new career in international development, completing an MSc in Development Economics at SOAS. Since then, Graham has worked across Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia in a variety of roles.
From 2013 to 2022, he served as Chairman of British International Investment (formerly CDC), overseeing a period of significant growth, with annual investments exceeding $2 billion and major contributions to infrastructure, including over 6 per cent of power generation in Sub-Saharan Africa. He also led the organisation through the passing of the £12 billion CDC Act in 2018. In Nepal, Graham founded Samriddha Pahad in 2009, a microfinance organisation now spearheading efforts to establish Kangchenjunga as Nepal’s first UNESCO World Biosphere. He is also Chair of Sir Ed Hillary’s Himalayan Trust UK.
Graham was awarded a KCMG in 2020 for services to international development. He served on the St John’s Investment Committee from 2001 to 2015 and was made an Honorary Fellow in 2025. He holds an MBA from INSEAD, where he was a Visiting Professor for 10 years, is currently a Visiting Fellow at Reuben College, Oxford, and serves as a Deputy Lieutenant for Surrey. Together with his wife, Mia, he set up Chilworth Manor Vineyard in 2013.
Yijing Li (2008)
Yijing read PhD in Geography of Crime at St John’s 2008-12, after completing a MSc in Urban Ecology at Peking University 2005-08. She is currently a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in the Department of Informatics at King’s College London.
Yijing has over 15 years’ teaching and research experience in higher education and is leading an interdisciplinary urban data scientists’ team to integrate diverse data into tangible analytical workflows, in order to generate data-driven evidence for policy making. They work closely with partners from public sectors, industry and charity organisations, telling urban stories with real-life data on health, safety, mobility, sustainability and resilience.
While at St John’s, Yijing was the Treasurer for the SBR (postgraduate society).
Ian Roberts (1975)
Ian studied Natural Sciences and Chemical Engineering at St John’s, matriculating in 1975 and graduating in 1979. Ian was sponsored by Imperial Chemical Industries. He represented John’s at association and rugby union football, hockey and cricket.
After Cambridge Ian worked for Ferranti Computer Systems Limited in the process control department. His last role was based at HGB in Heysham. In 1989 he moved to Software Partnership Limited, a supplier of software to banks. Banking software had just become real time. Assignments followed in Glasgow, Saudi Arabia, Ankara, Chicago, Melbourne and finally at Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) in Edinburgh where he became an independent consultant before joining RBS on a permanent basis.
Ian retired in 2011 and is now living in Edinburgh. He is a scorer for Cricket Scotland, a member of Lord’s Taverners and Marylebone Cricket Club. He’s a proud winner of the Johnian Golf Society’s 2022 Edward Marshall Hall Golf Cup and represents the Scottish Thistles in veterans hockey. Ian is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. He served on the Cambridge University Alumni Advisory Board (AAB) from 2015 to 2021 and is now a member of the Networks and Volunteers Working Group of the AAB and a committee member of the Cambridge Society of Edinburgh.
Steven Rosenhek (1984)
Steven completed his Master of Laws degree at St John’s College in 1984-85, shortly after qualifying as a lawyer in Canada. Following his return to Canada, he spent his career in civil litigation, practising in international law firms based in Toronto with a focus on commercial disputes, arbitrations and class actions. Alongside his practice, he taught trial advocacy at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law and at Osgoode Hall Law School, and was active in the profession, including as President of the Ontario Bar Association.
Steven retired from legal practice at the end of 2024. He now devotes his time to charitable and community work, including service on several boards, and some entrepreneurial projects. Earlier in his career, he helped organise alumni gatherings for St John’s in Toronto.
While at Cambridge, Steven lived in Merton Hall and spent at least as much time in the Buttery (in its then modest and rather more intimate form ) as in the law library, in the company of fellow graduate students. He served as the student representative on the Law Faculty Council and looks back on his year at St John’s with great affection.
