Simon Poole, the popular and much-loved Chief Operating Officer of WightFibre, was tragically killed after being hit by a car in Southampton on Monday night.
47-year-old Simon joined WightFibre in January 2017 and was a key member of WightFibre’s management team leading the award-winning, sales, service and field engineering teams. Amongst Simon’s many achievements at WightFibre was the recruitment of over 30 new employees, many of whom he personally coached and mentored.
John Irvine, CEO of WightFibre, has today (Thursday) paid tribute to him. John has said:
“This truly tragic event has shocked us all. Simon was a truly devoted family man. Our thoughts are first and foremost with Simon’s wife and young family at this very difficult time.
“Simon will be sorely missed by his family, his colleagues here at WightFibre , our customers, suppliers and business partners across the island”.
Prior to WightFibre, Simon worked at SSE Telecom in Reading. From 2009-2012, Simon worked with WightFibre CEO John Irvine as UK Sales Director for Truphone, a global mobile network operator. Before that Simon worked in start-up companies including his own start up specialising in Blackberry smartphone services.
Simon joined the Royal Navy straight from school and he was very proud to have completed operational deployments to the Falkland Islands and the Middle East.
Earlier this year Simon celebrated his 21st wedding anniversary with his wife Louise. He lived with Louise and their 3 children aged 6, 15 and 18 in Sway, New Forest.
Monday’s incident happened outside the Red Funnel car ferry terminal. The driver of a BMW X5, a 39-year-old man from Southampton, was arrested on suspicion of causing death by careless driving but has since been released under investigation.
How very sad at this time of year.
Would it be even sadder any other time of year???????
Truly awful, the children will have forever more Christmas as a reminder of their terrible loss.
Please drive more carefully, don’t drink or indulge in drugs and then drive.
Sure most get away with it, but, the ones who don’t ruin lives forever.