Leading Edge Group's Australian CEO swaps roles to focus on digital solutions

Leading Edge Group’s Australian chief executive Graham Dear has changed up his role to chief executive of digital solutions, a role focused on helping the buying group build out new digital innovations.

Dear is shifting into the role completely, having held it in conjunction with being the group CEO for the past year and a half.

“Given the incredibly positive response from the market to our app solutions and eCommerce solutions, Redeem and Everybuy, and the emerging opportunities to white label them, it is now time to give it dedicated focus and take it to more customers and new markets,” he said.

Leading Edge Group has not yet determined who will replace Dear, with that process expected to take between six to eight weeks.

Leading Edge’s Redeem application was born from discussions with LEG members and vendor partners and offers an ordering platform for promotional stock and clearance items or conference specials.

“There was nothing on the market that easily put these deals in front of the independent businesses in an efficient and timely manner.  Redeem does that and more as it is particularly good at also communicating out a vast range of member benefits,” Dear said.

Everybuy is the group’s e-commerce and online point of sale solution for end users. It faces consumers and has a B2B portal for business customers.

Reflecting on his time as group chief executive, which he held for five years after being promoted from group general manager, Dear highlighted his passion for working in the small-medium enterprise space.

“Having grown up in regional Australia, and then worked in large corporate businesses in Australia and overseas followed by owning my own business, I came into the role with an empathy and understanding of the importance of SME businesses in Australia, and some of the hardships and competition they face,” he said.

“It was and continued to be important to me to understand how we could add value to our customers (members) businesses, whilst also adding value to our vendor partners and remaining relevant to both.

"I am most proud of the hard-working team we have at LEG who understand and embrace these goals and the need for continual evolution of our model to keep meeting the goals.”