European Association Conference 2022

Tor McLaren has a wide range of experience across media and communications, finance, intelligence and strategy. He is a founder at Tiller, a trusted and connected network with recourse to hard-to-access information and authenticated insights. He is a former partner of Nash Capital Group, which provides funding, M&A and corporate finance advisory services, alongside direct investment access to rapidly growing private companies. He was appointed member of the Trade Policy Research Centre’s Strategic Advisory Committee, a specialist group of political strategists advising government on international trade policy and activity. Prior to that, he had a spent his career launching, acquiring and selling media businesses, including the launch of Australia’s Foxtel and Galaxy platforms, before returning to the UK to work for NBC Universal’s UK and EMEA television channels business as Director of Channels. Having served on the boards of start-ups and multinationals, Tor has a broad knowledge of corporate governance issues, with skills that encompass corporate strategic development, marketing and communications, public policy presentation and change leadership. He is a Fellow of The Royal Society of Arts and an active supporter of research into cancer and genetic disease and has served on board of the National Institute of Health Research’s Pancreas Biomedical Research Unit.

H.S.H. Prince Michael of Liechtenstein is Executive Chairman of Industrie- und Finanzkontor Etablissement. Furthermore, he is the Founder and Chairman of Geopolitical Intelligence Services AG, a geopolitical consultancy company and information platform headquartered in Liechtenstein, as well as founder and publisher of the German-language online platform _DER PRAGMATICUS_. In addition, Prince Michael of Liechtenstein is Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Foundation for Economic Governance and Public Law in Vaduz, Chairman of Liechtenstein Finance e.V., member of the International Institute of Longevity as well as Chairman of the liberal think tank European Center of Austrian Economics Foundation.

Tina Fordham is a geopolitical strategist and advisor working at the intersection of geopolitics, financial markets and the drivers of social change. The first Chief Global Political Analyst on Wall Street and previously, head of global political risk at Eurasia Group, Tina has over 20 years’ experience advising senior leaders—from prime ministers and 3-star generals to the C-suite, institutional investors and the United Nations—about the implications of global political, security and socio-economic developments. In 2022 Tina founded Fordham Global Foresight, an independent consultancy. Her holistic, data-driven approach focuses on breaking down the complexity of geopolitics and providing actionable, forward-looking guidance. Current themes include populism, the return of geopolitical risk— including Russia-Ukraine and China-US/EU relations, the future of globalisation, and the “S” in ESG. Tina is a member of the international advisory boards of the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs in New York City, her alma mater, and the Cambridge University Centre for Geopolitics. She advises the U.K. Ministry of Defence, and is a member of the advisory committees on Diversity & Inclusion and Economic and Commercial Diplomacy with the International Business and Diplomatic Exchange. She is a member of the board of Roots for Peace, a California charity dedicated to removing land mines from conflict zones and planting grapevines in their place. Tina is a contributor to Forbes magazine on business and geopolitics and frequent guest on Bloomberg, CNBC, CNN and the BBC. She is based in London and is a dual US-U.K. citizen.

Professor Russell Napier is author of The Solid Ground investment report for institutional investors and co-founder of the investment research portal ERIC- a business he now co-owns with D.C. Thomson. Russell has worked in the investment business for over 30 years and has been advising global institutional investors on asset allocation since 1995. Russell is author of the book Anatomy of The Bear: Lessons From Wall Street’s Four Great Bottoms (‘a cult classic’ according to the FT) and is founder and course director of The Practical History of Financial Markets at The Edinburgh Business School. Russell is Chairman of Mid Wynd International Investment Trust a GBP500m market cap. closed end investment vehicle listed on the London Stock Exchange. He is a member of the investment advisory committees of three fund management companies, Cerno Capital, Kennox Asset Management and Bay Capital. In 2014 Russell founded the charitable venture The Library of Mistakes a business and financial history library in Edinburgh that now has branches in India and Switzerland. Russell has degrees in law from Queen’s University Belfast and Magdalene College Cambridge. He is a Fellow of The CFA Society of the UK and is an Honorary Professor at The University of Stirling and a Visiting Professor at Heriot-Watt University. He is a contributing columnist for The Toronto Star newspaper. His second book – The Asian Financial Crisis 1995-1998: Birth of the Age of Debt- was published in July 2021.

Sir Michael Fallon is chairman of Aberdeen Standard Investcorp Infrastructure Partners, deputy chairman of Genel Energy PLC, and a former Secretary of State for Defence (2014-17). First elected to Parliament in 1983. Sir Michael served as a Minister in four Conservative governments. He was Schools Minister under Margaret Thatcher and John Major; Business and Energy Minister under David Cameron, and Defence Secretary for both David Cameron and Theresa May. As Minister for Business Sir Michael had responsibility for the aerospace, automotive, chemical and steel industries. As Minister for Energy he had responsibility for nuclear, oil, gas, electricity and renewables. As Defence Secretary Sir Michael had overall responsibility for the armed forces and led the British contribution to the counter-Daesh campaign in Iraq and Syria. Sir Michael writes and broadcasts on security and foreign affairs. He is a UK Member of the Indo-Pacific Commission, and a member of the Advisory Council of the Centre for Policy Studies. Previously Sir Michael has been a director of several companies with entrepreneur Duncan Bannatyne, and a non-executive director of Tullett Prebon PLC. He is also chairman of Avanton Ltd (property development) and a consultant to other companies.

_Senior investment banking professional,_ coming from legal, _amassing over 18 years’ experience with extensive cross border investment activities between UK, Europe, Latin America and Africa._ _From 2017 at Wimmer Financial LLP in London UK, in charge of Private Capital Advisory and Global Macro Economic Research, prior he was a senior investment team member of a Private Equity Fund (Fir Capital Partners SA) and an IB boutique firms (Sao Paulo Investments SA/G5 Evercore Partners) based in Brazil for 9 years and he began his career as business lawyer in M&A department in Italy. Antonio has extensive “hands on” experience in Private Markets (Renewables/Infrastructure, AgriCommodities, Real Estate and Consumer Goods) across UK, Europe, LatAm._ _Antonio _from 2019, a Non-Executive Director at The Academy Ambassador the School’ Network by Department of UK Education in London, and Little Square Capital and he _is frequently contributor of several financial and economic conferences and magazines and he speaks fluently English, Portuguese and Italian._

Executive Vice President Business Development David has over ten years of experience in the mining and mine finance industries. He started his career in Equity Research at BMO Capital Markets before joining Kulczyk Investments, a Polish family investment company. Whilst at KI, David was part of the establishment of QKR Corporation, a private mining investment company, and was seconded to the business development team which acquired the Navachab gold mine from Anglogold Ashanti. Prior to joining Elemental, David was Vice President at Tamesis Partners LLP, specialising in corporate advisory, research, and equity capital markets.

Chief Executive Officer John has over two decades of experience in the field of university research strategy and research commercialization. He holds a BA in law from Oxford, an MA from McGill, and is a qualified chartered accountant. He was the Financial Director of IndexIT, a successful London-based technology advisory boutique and then went on to become a founding director, CFO and COO of IP Group plc (LSE:IPO), partnering with British universities to help commercialize their research assets. He subsequently joined the founding team of Scientific Research Capital, a business that invested in deep science origination and commercialization, primarily in Europe.

Executive Chairman Jamie Keech is the Executive Chairman and co-founder of Vida Carbon. Jamie has nearly two decades of experience in the natural resource sector and has been involved in founding, incubating and financing numerous companies. Jamie is a Partner at Inventa Capital, a private natural resources venture builder and investment company, he is also the founder and CIO of Resource Insider an independent investment research firm providing investors access to exclusive research focused on the natural resource sector. Jamie holds a Master of Engineering with a focus on sustainable development & carbon capture for the mining industry from Exeter University and a Bachelor of Science in Mineral Engineering from the University of Toronto.

CEO & Co-Founder Jay is both the visionary leader of this new company but at the same time brings day-to-day balance to the team to foster both quick-to-market client opportunities with focused, disciplined attention on the challenges inherent in their execution. Jay draws on his 25-plus years of experience as a seasoned software executive. Jay began his career at Gandalf Technologies, an Ottawa-based pioneer of data communications technology. He later served as Country Manager (Canada) of Ascend Communications during their rapid growth, public offering, and ultimate sale to Lucent Technologies.

Simon Minder is an independent family office advisor with over 17 years of experience in the family office industry. Primarily, he supports families and single-family offices as member of the investment committee and/or represents them as a member of the board of directors for one of their investments. In addition, he supports families in setting up their family office. As part of this offering, he helps in the selection process for a suitable software solution. He also supports existing family offices in the selection and/or replacement process of software solutions.

Sara is an economist and former Global Head at JP Morgan Private Bank who stepped across to working directly with family offices over 6 years ago. She is passionate about bring more people into finance, particular private markets and less liquid investments – and was delighted to join NCA as an advisor, which provides curated Private Equity style deal flow for family offices. She is also an active real estate investor, introducer and journalist, with many articles to her name in the Evening Standard. 

Sweta is the Head of Investments, Europe, at Moonfare. She leads the investment team with a global remit across Private Markets asset classes. She also leads Moonfare's global efforts within Sustainable Investments and Private Credit, and is actively involved in developing Moonfare's co-investment capabilities. Sweta has over a decade of private markets experience, investing in both funds and co-investments across a number of investment strategies. Prior to Moonfare, she was the head of bfinance's private equity advisory where she advised a range of institutional investors globally on investment due-diligence, strategy and implementation within the asset class. Previously she worked on the investment team of the £30bn UK Railways Pension Scheme RPMI Railpen. She has also held roles at USS. Adveq and ABN Amro, and has an MBA from INSEAD and an LLB from the London School of Economics.

As Managing Director of Global, Grayson is responsible for leading First Rate’s business development efforts, operations, and product strategy in international markets. Greer’s primary focus is bringing wealth management solutions into new market regions through direct relationships, channel partners, and venture acquisitions and investments. Outside of First Rate, Grayson serves on the board of Center Court Tennis, a local non-profit which hosts tennis camps for children and adults with disabilities. 

Niall is the Managing Director of InDecision Limited, a boutique management consultancy, and is a Senior Consultant to the Landytech team. Niall specialises in commercial and operational strategy for financial services businesses, notably in the Fiduciary, Private Equity, Treasury and Investment sectors.  Previously he has held board level positions in Private Wealth, Funds, Corporate, Treasury and Investment businesses in Jersey, and served with HSBC in Paris as Head of Wealth, Europe and in Dubai as Head of Wealth Management, MENA. Originally a linguist, his first role was as an interpreter at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

Tomas felt compelled to co-found ORCA AG in 2017 after gaining first-hand insight from his personal network into the growing amount of tax, legal and compliance to-do's that modern ownership structures have to deal with. Having previously built technology platforms for investment banks and private banks, and inspired by "Everything Is Miscellaneous: The Power of the New Digital Disorder" by David Weinberger, Tomas and his Co-Founders set out to revolutionise the way wealth structuring, compliance, succession planning, tax and legal information is organised. Active in over 16 countries, ORCA is the world's first Getting Things Done (GTD) tool for complex ownership structures. Fast, intelligent, secure, and dare we say it fun, ORCA is a modern software application that is flipping the script for some of the most traditional topics in the world. 

Robert is Chief Investment Officer at CapGen, running all aspects of investment across client portfolios, including asset allocation, portfolio construction, risk management, investment research. He started his career at Merrill Lynch where he structured solutions for client portfolios using cash securities and derivatives. Robert has a double first-class Master of Mathematics degree from Oxford University a Master of Finance degree from Cambridge University where he won the Director’s Prize for graduating with the overall top mark. He is also a CFA® charterholder, holds the FRM designation from the Global Association of Risk Professionals and the CFA Certificate in ESG investing.

After working on Aid programmes in developing countries Peter became a financial analyst specialising in Energy and was made a Partner of a leading City firm. Elected to Parliament in 1983, he became a Treasury Minister, then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry under Mrs Thatcher and Secretary of State for Social Security under John Major. Peter ran for Leader of the Conservative Party becoming Shadow Chancellor then Deputy Leader of the Conservative Party Responsible for Policy Renewal. Peter chaired the joint Commons/Lords Committee on financial legislation following the banking crisis of 2008. Peter was made a peer in 2018.

Blake Shorthouse joined KKR in 2014 and leads the Client and Partner Group’s Family Capital team in EMEA. Prior to joining KKR, he held a number of senior roles at UBS & Credit Suisse in London and Zurich. Mr. Shorthouse is a Trustee of the National Portrait Gallery (London) and holds a joint honors degree in History and Politics, from Exeter University, UK.

The Rt Hon Sir Robert Buckland KBE KC MP was Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice from July 2019 to September 2021. In July 2022 he was appointed Secretary of State for Wales, a position he held until October. He was Minister of State at the Ministry of Justice from May 2019 to July 2019. He was previously Solicitor General. He was elected the Conservative MP for South Swindon in 2010. Robert was born in Llanelli in 1968. He went to Hatfield College, Durham, graduating in Law in 1990. Robert attended the Inns of Court School of Law, where he was a prize winner for Advocacy and was Called to the Bar at Inner Temple in October 1991.

Simon Minder is an independent family office advisor with over 17 years of experience in the family office industry. Primarily, he supports families and single-family offices as member of the investment committee and/or represents them as a member of the board of directors for one of their investments. In addition, he supports families in setting up their family office. As part of this offering, he helps in the selection process for a suitable software solution. He also supports existing family offices in the selection and/or replacement process of software solutions.