Tributes paid to SimplyBiz MD Ian Thorneycroft

Ian Thorneycroft, managing director of SimplyBiz, has died after a 15-month battle with cancer.

Ken Davy, chairman of the support services company, says Thorneycroft died peacefully in his sleep on Sunday evening.

Thorneycroft, the founding MD of SimplyBiz Services in 2002 and an AIFA director, had taken long-term leave from the business in March 2009 after being diagnosed with colon cancer.

Davy reveals Thorneycroft, who leaves a wife, two children and two grandchildren, was given hope only a fortnight ago that he had beaten the cancer.

"It is with enormous sadness and a very heavy heart that I have to inform you that Ian Thorneycroft, our much loved and sadly missed managing director, passed away peacefully in his sleep yesterday evening," Davy says in a statement.

"For the last 15 months Ian has fought a heroic battle against a particularly dreadful form of cancer. Throughout it all his positive attitude, humour and determination have been an inspiration to all, not just those of us who had the privilege of knowing him but to the whole of the financial services sector.

"Today's news comes only a few weeks after Ian and his wife Judith were given the hope that all had been cleared and barely two weeks since that good news was so cruelly reversed is hard for all of us to take or even comprehend. We all have our own very special memories of Ian and he will live in our hearts forever."

Thorneycroft, born in Macclesfield in 1955, began his career at Nationwide Building Society, later heading up its IFA subsidiary. He moved to Legal & General in 1996 and met Ken Davy through the Life Insurance Association in the late 1980s. He was founding managing director of SimplyBiz Services plc in 2002.

Nick Cann, chief executive of the Institute of Financial Planning (IFP), says: "Ian wanted to know more about the whole fee-based financial planning world when some people were saying it was a load of old tosh. He did his own research and his work feeds into what the IFP does today."

Davy says Thorneycroft has been an inspiration to other advisers through his enthusiasm and love of his profession.

Writing in a blog shortly after Thorneycroft's diagnosis last year, Davy said: "Ian's message to us all as financial advisers is that we should stand tall and be proud of what we do and the benefits we deliver.

"That we should never feel embarrassed at insisting our clients have the life assurance and critical illness protection we know they should have. This is the job we do and the responsibility we have and one day our clients or their families will thank us for it."

Responding to the blog himself on 21 April 2009, Thorneycroft said: "[This diagnosis] has been a powerful reminder to me of what an incredibly valuable profession if not vocation we perform."