Obituary: Sir Lewis Robertson

Lewis Robertson, who has died aged 85, built an awesome reputation as a "company doctor" who restored dozens of ailing companies to robust health. From 1976 until 1981, he was the first chief executive of the Scottish Development Agency, during a crowded career that justified his self-description as "the most methodical man in Scotland".

Robertson's highest-profile rescue was of the Stakis hotel and casino chain, built up by a Greek Cypriot immigrant, Sir Reo Stakis. As the business crumbled in the early 1990s, the ageing Stakis sent for Robertson, who promptly cut head-office staff by a third and sacked the founder's son, Andros, as chief executive. "There was no time for a personal retraining exercise," was the doctor's grim prognosis. The Stakis organisation was later sold to the Hilton group for £1.3bn.

The consultants WS Atkins represented a more recent success story, in 2002, when Robertson was almost 80. Within three years, the company's market capitalisation increased 12-fold and it survives as one of the world's leading engineering consultancies.

Roberton's formula for turnarounds was always the same. He insisted on becoming chairman and having absolute control. Then he pacified the bankers, slashed costs and cleared out management. Robertson's success rate was remarkable and tens of thousands of jobs were saved as a result.

His reputation as the genius of company rescues already well established, Robertson and Ken Scobie set up the first specialist consultancy in the field, Postern Executive Group, in 1990. Replying to criticism of fees charged for their services, Robertson replied brusquely: "I am expensive. It is very foolish to pretend there could, or should, be a cheap corporate rescue service. Anything companies get for peanuts is fit for nothing but monkeys."

Robertson was a Dundonian and his family's business roots were in two of the city's great industries, jute and jam. He was educated at the physically rigorous Glenalmond school and trained as an accountant, the offer of a place at Cambridge missed owing to second world war service in the RAF. Robertson joined as a photographer, but because he could read Italian was transferred to intelligence and worked as a code-breaker at Bletchley Park - an experience which, he later said, taught him the value of teamwork.

When he returned to Dundee, there were still 40 jute firms around the city, but the industry's fortunes were tied to trends in floorwear, and diversification was necessary. He spent 20 years developing one family business into a listed company, Robertson Industrial Textiles, but then took over a larger family-owned business that promptly rebelled against his strategy. "They didn't like the look of the 20th century when I hauled them into it," he later reflected. "Dundee is a smallish town, with limited ideas."

Married with four children, Robertson was spared unemployment by an approach to save Grampian Holdings, an ailing conglomerate. His success in this mission between 1971 and 1975 established his wider reputation. By then, he was also well-established in the public sector as a member of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission and chairman of a regional health authority. The Labour government was creating the Scottish Development Agency (SDA) to support economic development and Robertson was a business-friendly choice as chief executive.

By the time his initial term expired, the Tories were in power and Robertson had no desire to be in the frontline of increasingly partisan arguments about the role of bodies such as the SDA. Back in the private sector, he was in constant demand - particularly from the banks - as a turnaround specialist, and the rest of his career represented a combination of commercial success and an array of public positions. Robertson was, in every sense, a larger-than-life figure.

His legendary attention to the methodical use of his own time is reflected in the archive now held by the National Library of Scotland, which includes correspondence and comments relating to the myriad activities in which he was involved. Asked to list his recreations, he included "computer use and list-making". But his interests also ranged from Italian art to the Scottish Episcopal church and the well-being of Dundee University, of whose court he was chairman.

He is survived by two sons and a daughter, his wife, Elspeth. Another son predeceased him.