Panel members

Mandy is a non-executive director and Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee of Spectris plc.  She was CFO of Ascential, the formerly FTSE250 listed specialist events, intelligence and advisory company, until April 2025.  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 was also formerly a non-executive director of SDL plc where she chaired the Audit Committee.

Dr Hans-Christoph Hirt is an accredited professional trustee at Pi Partnership, an Advisory Partner at Fidelio, and a Senior Consultant at Arkadiko. He also serves as a Non-Executive Director and Trustee of the Hermes Group Pension Scheme, a member of the Investment Advisory Committee at WHEB, an impact-focused asset manager, and a member of the FCA’s Listing Authority Advisory Panel. 

With more than 25 years of experience in governance, corporate law, sustainable investing, stewardship, and shareholder activism, Hans advises institutional investors, company boards, and executive teams. He is also an Adjunct Professor at IMD and teaches at leading universities and business schools. A recognised expert and accomplished author, Hans has published widely in business and legal journals, as well as practitioner publications. He is the author of a book on directors’ duties and co-edited and contributed to a 2023 book on stewardship and sustainability in investment management.

Hans previously held senior leadership roles at global asset managers, including Managing Director for Sustainable Investing at UBS Asset Management. He also served as Managing Director and a board member of EOS at Federated Hermes, a leading provider of engagement and voting services, where he oversaw a fourfold increase in assets under advice to over $1.6 trillion. Before entering the asset management industry in 2004, Hans practised corporate law at international firm Ashurst and held academic positions at the London School of Economics, where he earned his PhD.
 

Hannah joined Barclays in September 2012 as Chief of Staff to the Investment Bank General Counsel and having moved from the Legal Function to Barclays Corporate Secretariat in 2016, was subsequently appointed Deputy Company Secretary of Barclays PLC in 2018. In February 2023, Hannah was appointed Group Company Secretary and in May 2024 Hannah was asked to join the Group Executive Committee as a standing invitee.

She has extensive experience in corporate governance, regulatory, disclosure and market conduct matters.

Prior to joining Barclays, Hannah was a Senior Associate in the London Corporate Finance practice of Clifford Chance LLP.

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.

Kwok is the Deputy Treasurer, Group Head of Funding & Investment for National Grid. He has group wide responsibility for funding in a diverse range of markets, debt investor relations, managing banking relationships, investment of surplus cash, and managing financial risk, particularly with derivatives. With over 24 years of experience, he has led the financing and pre-financing of all the major M&A and divestures at National Grid over the last 10 years. Prior to his current role, he has held various roles in the treasury team. He has also served as a Trustee of National Grid UK Pension Scheme on both the Board and Funding & Investment Committee.

Kwok is also a member of the Treasury Committee at Clarion Housing Group since July 2017

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.

James is 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 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.

Victoria Whyte is Company Secretary of GlaxoSmithKline plc group.  She joined GSK’s Corporate Secretariat in 1998 as Director of Secretariat Services. She was appointed Deputy Company Secretary in 2005 and the Group Company Secretary with effect from 1 January 2011.

Victoria has acted as Secretary to the Remuneration Committee since 2009 and acts as Secretary to all of the Board Committees since her appointment as Company Secretary.

Prior to joining GlaxoSmithKline, Victoria worked in various company secretarial roles within BAE Systems, Coats Viyella, St. Ives plc, Schroder Investment Management and Vickers plc.

She is a solicitor and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators.  She sits on the CBI Companies Committee

James is a corporate partner and Global Co-Head of Equity Capital Markets at Linklaters LLP in London. His areas of practice include public and private securities offerings of all types, along with mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, governance matters and general corporate work across a number of sectors. He regularly advises a wide range of corporate, fund and investment bank clients. He is ranked in Legal500’s Hall of Fame for high-end equity capital markets.

James has been closely involved in many important areas of relevant regulatory reform, including advising AFME and UK Finance on the recent and ongoing reforms to the UK’s Listing and Public Offer regimes, and is part of CityUK’s Capital Markets Group.