Panel members

Mandy has been CFO of Ascential, the formerly FTSE250 listed specialist events, intelligence and advisory company, since 2013.  She was a key member of the team that led the company’s IPO in 2016 as well as its strategic review and return of value in 2023/2024 and subsequently the recommended offer for, and acquisition of, the company by Informa plc in 2024.

Before joining Ascential, Mandy was CFO at Torex, and helped manage the successful turnaround and sale of that business. Prior to that, she was CFO at Detica Group plc, a technology consultancy; Director of Corporate Development at Telewest; and Group Financial Controller at Dalgety. She began her career at Price Waterhouse, where she qualified as a Chartered Accountant.

She is a non-executive director and Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee of Spectris plc and was formerly a non-executive director of SDL plc where she chaired the Audit Committee.

Gary is Head of the Liquidity and Capital Markets team at BP p.l.c. He has worked for BP within the Treasury team for the past 27 years. On joining BP, he initially worked in the Risk Management team managing BP’s foreign exchange exposures before moving to the Capital Markets team, which is responsible for all aspects of its equity and debt activities as well short-term cash forecasting.

Gary joined the Board of Metropolitan Thames Valley Housing in June 2022 where he is the Chair of the Treasury Committee. 

Prior to joining BP, he worked within the banking sector concentrating on the new issue and derivatives markets where he had several trading and risk management roles.

Dr Hans-Christoph Hirt is Managing Director and Head of Impact Engagement at UBS Asset Management, leading on focused corporate engagement.

Prior to joining UBS, Hans was the Managing Director and a member of the Board of EOS at Federated Hermes. EOS is a global provider of engagement and voting services. Hans is also a non-executive director of Hermes Pension Trustees Limited, the legacy pension scheme of Hermes Investment Management.

He began his career at law firm Ashurst in London, where he qualified as a solicitor, after teaching corporate law at the London School of Economics.

He is affiliated with the Law School at University College London (UCL). He is also author of articles and thought pieces on a range of corporate governance and sustainability topics and the co-editor of a forthcoming book on Investment Management, Stewardship and Sustainability.

Virginia is Head of UK & Ireland Equity Advisory at BNP Paribas.

Prior to this, Virginia was Head of UK Sponsor Services, responsible for FCA liaison and all sponsor matters for JP Morgan Cazenove having joined the UK IPO and ECM execution team in 2007 working across UK equity capital markets, M&A, Corporate Broking, Debt and debt capital markets. Virginia started her career in KPMG Corporate Finance focusing on public company and TMT advisory in her eight years there and she spent a year on secondment at the UKLA department in the former FSA.

Kimberley Lewis is the Head of Active Ownership at Schroders, an active asset manager. She has 25 years experience in sustainability, law and public policy.

Prior to joining Schroders, she served as Director of North America Engagement for Federated Hermes EOS, International, where she led board and executive level engagements with a portfolio of companies on ESG and long-term business strategy issues across equity and fixed income holdings.

Before joining EOS, Kimberley was the Senior Director of Global Corporate Responsibility at Pfizer Inc, where she was responsible for driving Pfizer's strategy for global public health and patient impact in underserved communities. Prior to that, she was the Director of Public Policy and Issues Management at AstraZeneca, where she led the company's work on access to medicines in underserved markets.

She was also a senior advisor to Cherie Blair, where she played a key role in establishing the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women. Kimberley is a US-qualified attorney, with a BA and JD from the University of Virginia and holds an MA from London Business School, where she was a Sloan Fellow and Recipient of the Sloan Woman's Scholarship.

Kathryn McLeland is CFO at M&G Plc. Kathryn joined M&G from Barclays PLC, where she served for over 20 years, most recently as Group Treasurer and before that as Head of Investor Relations.

Prior to that she worked in investment banking at Barclays, Merrill Lynch and Salomon Brothers, focused on Financial Institutions. In addition to her responsibilities overseeing M&G plc’s financial operations and strategy, Kathryn champions the company’s focus on sustainability and diversity and inclusion.

Giles joined Advent in 2014. Working closely with the sector teams, he is responsible for leading new acquisition financings and capital markets activities for Advent’s portfolio companies, as well as managing and helping to grow the firm’s relationships with investment banks.

Prior to joining Advent, Giles spent 10 years working in leverage finance, most recently at Goldman Sachs in London, and also previously worked for RBS on their leverage finance team. During this time, he worked on a large number of loan and high yield bond transactions for both sponsor and corporate clients.

Giles holds a BSc, with Honours, in Economics and Econometrics from Nottingham University.

Aileen is a qualified lawyer who is currently the Group Company Secretary and Chief Governance Officer of HSBC Holdings plc, a position she was appointed to in November 2019.

Before HSBC, Aileen spent 19 years at the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, where she held various roles in legal, risk and compliance. She was appointed Group Secretary at RBS in 2010 and held the role of Chief Governance Officer and Board Counsel until her departure from RBS in 2019.

Aileen is also a member of the European Corporate Governance Council and the GC100.

James is Co-Head of Investment Banking at Deutsche Numis as well as heading their IPO business. He has over 20 years of UK ECM, Broking, Corporate Finance and FCA Sponsor experience, having worked for HSBC Investment Bank between 2000 and 2007, before spending 9 years at JP Morgan Cazenove as Head of their UK IPO and ECM Execution Team. 

He joined Numis in September 2016 and was appointed Co-Head of Investment Banking in March 2019, before becoming Co-Head of Investment Banking for Deutsche Numis following Deutsche Bank’s acquisition of Numis in 2023. Through his banking career, James has gained a broad experience of equity fundraisings, M&A and FCA Sponsor transactions, in addition to leading numerous UK IPOs. 

Prior to joining HSBC in 2000, James qualified as a chartered accountant with E&Y. 

Amanda has been a partner at Allen & Overy LLP since 2007. She is the Head of the London International Capital Markets group and heads up the International Capital Markets Know-How & Training team, in which role she is responsible for the development and management of internal and external knowledge resources and training programmes.

She is actively involved in many industry working groups on debt capital markets related issues, including the impact of the EEA Prospectus and Market Abuse regimes, the Transparency Directive, the PRIIPs Regulation, MiFID, IBOR discontinuation and Brexit on the markets.

Amanda is a regular speaker on Allen & Overy's internal and external training programmes and at external conferences. Prior to taking on a knowledge role, Amanda worked as an associate at Allen & Overy gaining experience of a wide range of international capital markets transactions, including vanilla debt issues, ECP, Global CP and EMTN Programmes, structured and equity linked issues and covered warrant issues.

Charlie is Deputy CEO of the London Stock Exchange plc having joined in 2018 to lead the Equity and Fixed Income Primary Markets businesses.   

Charlie is a capital markets specialist and previously worked within J.P. Morgan Cazenove’s Equity Capital Markets team responsible for originating and executing equity transactions. He has assisted in raising over £45bn of equity capital across five continents on behalf of clients. 

During his time at JPMC, Charlie also worked in Sydney raising capital for companies on the Australian Stock Exchange as well as taking primary responsibility for the South African equity capital markets practice. 

Sam Ward is Head of European Equity Capital Markets at Capital Group. His team works with investment analysts to source and access primary new issuance across European markets, as well as being responsible for a range of other capital market events across private and public markets.

Sam is actively involved in many industry working groups and is a regular speaker at external conferences. Prior to joining Capital in 2014, Sam worked at Barclays Corporate Bank, as well as in equities at UBS. Sam graduated from Aston Business School with a BSc in Management and Strategy and is CFA Charterholder and member of CFA Society UK.

Caroline has been a partner at Deloitte for eight years, specialising in Equity Capital Markets.

She has been at Deloitte since 2001, qualifying as a Chartered Accountant and focusing on financial due diligence. From late 2006, Caroline spent four years at the UK Listing Authority, returning to Deloitte in 2011 to focus exclusively on ECM. She has provided readiness advisory services to UK and international companies preparing to list in London as well as leading both reporting accountant work and company-side transaction support to those pursuing a listing and to listed companies in respect of significant transactions and equity fundraisings.