Overview:

Lord Browne is President of the Royal Academy of Engineering and was group Chief Executive of BP until his resignation on 1 May 2007. Since 2001, he has been a crossbench member of the House of Lords.

Browne was born in Hamburg, Germany, to a British Army officer father and a Hungarian Auschwitz survivor mother. His father also worked in civilian life for Anglo-Persian Oil, which later became British Petroleum. He was educated at the King's School, Ely and St John's College, Cambridge, where he earned a First Class Bachelor's degree in Physics.

He holds a degree in Physics from Cambridge University and an MS in Business from Stanford University, California. He has also been awarded Honorary Doctorates from Heriot Watt University (D.Eng) and Robert Gordon University (D.Tech), Dundee University (LLD), Warwick University (D.Sc), Hull University (D.Sc), Cranfield University (D.Sc), Sheffield Hallam University (Hon. D Univ), University of Buckingham (D.Sc), University of Belfast (Hon DSc 0 Eng) and the University of Surrey (Hon D. Univ), Imperial College, London (Hon D.Sc), (Leuven University, Belgium (D.Sc), Thunderbird (LLD), University of Notre Dame (LLD), Colorado School of Mines (D.Eng), D Mendeleyev University of Chemical Technology of Russia, Arizona State University (DHLitt). He is an Honorary Fellow of St John’s College, Cambridge and a Senior Member of St Antony’s College, Oxford.

He is a Fellow and President of The Royal Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Royal Society, a Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, a Fellow of the Institute of Petroleum, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, a Companion of the Institute of Management, an Honorary Fellow of the Institution of Chemical Engineers, an Honorary Fellow of the Geological Society, an Honorary Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Career at BP

At the suggestion of his father, Browne joined BP as an apprentice in 1966 while still at university and remained with the corporation throughout his career. Between 1969 and 1983, he held a variety of exploration and production posts in Anchorage, Alaska, New York, San Francisco, London and Canada. In 1984 he became Group Treasurer and Chief Executive of BP Finance International.

In April 1986, he took up the position of Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of The Standard Oil Company in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1987, following the BP/Standard merger, in addition to his position as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of BP America, he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Standard Oil Production Company.

In 1989, he became Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of BP Exploration based in London. In September 1991, he joined the Board of The British Petroleum Company plc. as a Managing Director. He was appointed Group Chief Executive on 10 June 1995. Following the merger of BP and Amoco, he became Group Chief Executive of the combined group on 31 December 1998 until 1 May 2007.

Current Activities

He is Managing Director and Managing Partner (Europe) of Riverstone Holdings LLC.

He became President of the Royal Academy of Engineering in July 2006. He took over from Frances Cairncross as President of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in September 2006, and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2006. In 1998, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II and in 2001 named by the House of Lords Appointments Commission as one of the "people's peers" taking the title Baron Browne of Madingley, of Cambridge in the County of Cambridgeshire, and becoming a crossbencher in the House of Lords. In 2000 he was the recipient of the FIRST Responsible Capitalism Award.

He was appointed a Trustee of the Tate Gallery on 1 August 2007 and Chair of the Trustees in January 2009.

In November 2009 it was announced that Lord Browne will chair a government committee into university tuition fees due to report in 2010.

Lord Browne lists 17th and 18th Century illustrated Italian books, pre-Columbian art, contemporary Art, music, opera and the theatre among his interests.