Professor Amin Rajan

Chief Executive Officer, CREATE-Research

Biography

Amin is the author of eleven highly acclaimed research reports and numerous books and articles on leadership, business cultures, socio-economic forecasting, globalization, new technologies, diversity and new business models. His expertise covers, amongst others, leadership and new business models in financial services. He has presented the results of his research at over 100 major events in the USA, Europe and Asia-Pacific in the last five years, and designed and delivered over 100 leadership programmes for large public and private sector organizations. Prof Rajan is a regular contributor of feature articles to the Financial Times and Global Investor. He has also acted as a senior consultant to global companies and the public sector from Microsoft to Department of Education; from Rusal to Newcastle City Council; from BP to Cabinet Office; from Anglian Water to Ministry of Defence. Amin provides coaching and mentoring services to many CEOs.

Willie Watt

Chief Executive Officer, Martin Currie

Biography

Martin Currie is an independent employee owned international equities boutique. It is based in Edinburgh with offices in London, New York, Shanghai, Singapore, Melbourne and, in January 2010, Zurich. The company has a blue chip global client base. The business is focussed on creating a market leading position for its chosen equity strategies through the delivery of investment excellence while remaining an employee owned business. Willie Watt joined the company in early 2001 as CEO following a career in private equity with 3i.

Chris Samuel

Chief Executive Officer, Ignis Asset Management

Biography

Chris was appointed CEO Ignis in August 2009. Prior to joining the Phoenix Group in February 2009, Chris held, over some 15 years, Board positions at Gartmore, Hill Samuel Asset Management and Cambridge Place. Prior to this Chris, who qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG, spent 10 years in senior Financial roles with Prudential- Bache in London, Toronto, Tokyo and New York.

Keith Skeoch

Chief Executive Officer, Standard Life Investments

Biography

As Chief Executive, Keith Skeoch is responsible for all company business and investment operations within Standard Life Investments. He is also an Executive Director of Standard Life plc.

Keith joined Standard Life Investments as Chief Investment Officer from James Capel & Co (now HSBC Securities), where he was employed from 1980 to 1999. From his first role at James Capel as an International Economist, Keith went on to become Senior UK Economist in 1982 and Chief Economist two years later. In 1993 he was appointed Director of Economics and Strategy.

He has acted as a Pension Fund Trustee for both the James Capel and Standard Life schemes. He currently sits on the boards of the Investment Management Association and ABI, where he also chairs the Investment Committee.

Willie Watt

Chief Executive Officer, Martin Currie

Biography

Martin Currie is an independent employee owned international equities boutique. It is based in Edinburgh with offices in London, New York, Shanghai, Singapore, Melbourne and, in January 2010, Zurich. The company has a blue chip global client base. The business is focussed on creating a market leading position for its chosen equity strategies through the delivery of investment excellence while remaining an employee owned business. Willie Watt joined the company in early 2001 as CEO following a career in private equity with 3i.

Chris Samuel

Chief Executive Officer, Ignis Asset Management

Biography

Chris was appointed CEO Ignis in August 2009. Prior to joining the Phoenix Group in February 2009, Chris held, over some 15 years, Board positions at Gartmore, Hill Samuel Asset Management and Cambridge Place. Prior to this Chris, who qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG, spent 10 years in senior Financial roles with Prudential- Bache in London, Toronto, Tokyo and New York.

Keith Skeoch

Chief Executive Officer, Standard Life Investments

Biography

As Chief Executive, Keith Skeoch is responsible for all company business and investment operations within Standard Life Investments. He is also an Executive Director of Standard Life plc.

Keith joined Standard Life Investments as Chief Investment Officer from James Capel & Co (now HSBC Securities), where he was employed from 1980 to 1999. From his first role at James Capel as an International Economist, Keith went on to become Senior UK Economist in 1982 and Chief Economist two years later. In 1993 he was appointed Director of Economics and Strategy.

He has acted as a Pension Fund Trustee for both the James Capel and Standard Life schemes. He currently sits on the boards of the Investment Management Association and ABI, where he also chairs the Investment Committee.

Margaret Harwood-Jones

Head of Client Segment, Institutional Investors, BNP Paribas Securities Services

Biography

Margaret joined BNP Paribas in 2001 and her current role is to lead the business development, relationship management and client service management effort for Institutional Investor clients on a global basis. She is a member of the BNP Paribas Securities Services Management Comex. Margaret has over 25 years experience in Financial Services, in various senior management positions primarily within the securities services environment.

Prior to joining BNP Paribas Margaret worked for HSBC, undertaking a number of different management roles in Asset Management, Personal Financial Services, Trust Company and Securities Services. Latterly as Deputy Head of Global Investor Services Margaret had responsibility for sales, marketing, relationship management and client services. She was also responsible for the bank’s unit trust trusteeship business. Margaret was instrumental in the establishment of DATA (Depositary and Trustee Association) and was a member of its initial Executive Committee.

She is an affiliate member of the Securities Institute and an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers.

Professor Amin Rajan

Chief Executive Officer, CREATE-Research

Biography

Amin is the author of eleven highly acclaimed research reports and numerous books and articles on leadership, business cultures, socio-economic forecasting, globalization, new technologies, diversity and new business models. His expertise covers, amongst others, leadership and new business models in financial services. He has presented the results of his research at over 100 major events in the USA, Europe and Asia-Pacific in the last five years, and designed and delivered over 100 leadership programmes for large public and private sector organizations. Prof Rajan is a regular contributor of feature articles to the Financial Times and Global Investor. He has also acted as a senior consultant to global companies and the public sector from Microsoft to Department of Education; from Rusal to Newcastle City Council; from BP to Cabinet Office; from Anglian Water to Ministry of Defence. Amin provides coaching and mentoring services to many CEOs.

Rory Gage

Director, Navigant Consulting

Biography

His career in asset management has seen him take on a wide variety of portfolio management roles of both a retail and institutional type nature. He has also advised many clients on their strategic asset allocation decisions as well as actively managing this for a number of funds. Throughout this time he has also been actively involved in issues of corporate governance as well as the workings of the capital markets.

Robert is Deputy Chairman of the ABI Investment Committee. He is also a member of the IOD, the Asset Management Committee of the Investment Management Association, of the Pre-Emption Group, Senior Practitioners Committee of the FSA and the Takeover Appeals Board.

Bill Smith

Chief Executive Officer, Lazard Asset Management

Biography

Senior Managing Director, Chief Executive Officer (UK)

Bill Smith is Chief Executive of Lazard Asset Management Limited and is a member of the Oversight Committee that oversees our investment product platform worldwide. Prior to joining Lazard in 2002, he was Head of European Equities and Global Head of Research at ABN AMRO. Bill previously held a number of senior positions at Barclays Bank, including Head of Savings and Investment, Deputy Chairman of Barclays Asset Management and Head of Research at BZW. Bill has worked in the investment field since 1979. He qualified as a Fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries whilst at Standard Life and holds a BSc (Hons) degree in Pure Mathematics from Heriot Watt University. Bill is a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications and is a member of the Board of the Investment Management Association.

Colin Robertson

Global Head of Asset Allocation, Hewitt

Biography

Colin is Global Head of Asset Allocation at Hewitt and heads up the Asset Allocation Team based in London and Chicago. The team provides a Medium Term Asset Allocation service which seeks to add to investment performance through taking medium term asset allocation views and advises on the timing of strategic change. The team is additionally responsible for the long term investment assumptions used in investment and actuarial modelling. Colin is a member of the Global Investment Committee.

Colin has been Head of Asset Allocation at Merrill Lynch Investment Managers, Head of Strategy at Threadneedle Investments and Chief Investment Manager at a Life Office. He has a BSc (1st Class Honours) from the University of St Andrews and a Masters from UC Berkeley where he was a Fulbright Scholar. He is a Fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries.

David Cavaye

Head of Investment Strategy, C Hoare & Co.

Biography

David has 18 years experience in investment management, and has spent the last few years developing investment strategy at C. Hoare & Co. He and his team provide strategy solutions for the management of private client portfolios, charities, trusts and personal pension funds. After qualifying as a chartered accountant with Ernst & Young he spent ten years as an investment manager and director at Martin Currie Investment Management in Edinburgh. At C. Hoare & Co., David and his team research both traditional and alternative asset classes, including UK and international equity markets, bonds, hedge funds, private equity, property funds and derivative structured products.

Interests: The visual and performing arts and travel.

Rahul Shah

Manager, Official Institutions Group, State Street Global Advisors

Biography

Rahul is a Manager of State Street Global Advisors Ltd, Official Institutions Group - London. He joined SSgA in February 2007. He is responsible for the sales, service and relationship management for central banks, sovereign wealth funds and other public sector clients. Prior to joining SSgA, Rahul served as a Relationship Manager in corporate and institutional banking sectors of Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney. He started his career in India. He has worked in India and Australia for a total of 10 years in various banking sectors, and he is fluent in English, Hindi, Urdu and Gujarati.

Rahul received a Master of Business Administration in Finance from La Trobe University and a Bachelor of Commerce degree with Honours from Osmania University. He has earned MCSI qualification from Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment. He is FSA registered in the UK. He also has completed a Diploma in Computer Applications from Zen Computers.

Nick Blake

Head of Retail Sales, Vanguard

Biography

Nick Blake is Head of Sales for Vanguard Investments UK, Limited. Nick's 27 year career in the industry has covered many senior distribution management roles. He is responsible for the Vanguard UK sales team managing our Institutional and Retail client channels.

David Norman

Founder & Chief Executive Officer, TCF Investments

Biography

David Norman, known as DAN, began his career in financial services in 1986 as a direct salesman for London Life Association having originally trained as an industrial chemist. He held a number of senior sales and marketing roles in life and pensions companies ultimately specialising in asset management with Threadneedle Asset Management.

DAN was Managing Director of the Retail Business for Insight Investment and Director, Marketing and Products Morley (now Aviva Investors) before becoming the UK Chief Executive of Credit Suisse Asset Management.

He has recently established a new asset management business, TCF Investment, designed to bring ‘transparency, consistency and fairness’ to retail investors.

Dr Alwin G. Oerlemans

Director Client Solutions, APG Group

Biography

Dr. Alwin Oerlemans, CFA, FRM is Director Client Solutions at APG Institutional Clients. His focus is on pension asset & risk management and international pensions. Alwin has been at APG since 2006. Before APG, he worked for 9 years at merchant bank NIBC where he was involved in financial markets and pension fund risk management and 5 years at the Treasury of the Dutch Ministry of Finance in The Hague. Alwin holds a masters degree in Operations Research and Econometrics from Erasmus University Rotterdam, a PhD in Quantitative Economics from Maastricht University, both in the Netherlands, and is CFA and FRM (Financial Risk Manager) charter holder. He has written several articles on pension design, risk management and IORPs.

APG is one of the world’s largest pension administration organisations and is specialised in the administration of collective pensions. APG Group serves over four million pension fund members in the sectors education, government, construction and housing corporations. APG manages over € 200 billion of pension assets on behalf of these sectors. APG has offices in Amsterdam, Heerlen, Hong Kong and New York.

Jim McCaughan

Global Chief Executive Officer, Principal Global Investors

Biography

Jim is chief executive officer of Principal Global Investors. He also serves as president of global asset management for the Principal Financial Group. In this capacity, Jim oversees investment activities across asset classes and market regions, with primary responsibility for the strategic development of Principal’s asset management business globally. He has three decades of experience in the investment management industry. Prior to joining Principal Global Investors in 2002, Jim served as chief executive officer, Americas, with Credit Suisse Asset Management, New York. Prior to Credit Suisse, he was president and chief operating officer of Oppenheimer Capital, New York. Jim’s background also includes extensive experience with Phillips & Drew/UBS Asset Management in London, Zurich and New York, where he held the positions of chief executive officer for institutional asset management in North America, head of international business, and portfolio manager. As a portfolio manager, Jim specialized in the management of UK, Japanese and diversified international equity portfolios, primarily for institutional clients. His career began in 1974 as an actuary with Lane Clark & Peacock, London. Jim graduated in mathematics from the University of Cambridge (Pembroke College) and is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries.

Julian Young

Head of Hedge Fund Practice, Ernst & Young

Biography

JULIAN MAYO, Julian is Co-Head of Portfolio Advisory. He joined Charlemagne Capital in 2003 as Director of Charlemagne Capital (UK) Limited and a member of the portfolio advisory team. Julian has 25 years’ investment experience, most of which has been focused on emerging markets. Julian began his investment management career in Hong Kong with Schroders before joining Thornton Management (later Dresdner Thornton) in Hong Kong in 1985 as a fund manager. He opened Thornton’s Tokyo office in 1987, where he was responsible for North Asian stocks, before moving to London in 1991. After 11 years at Thornton, Julian joined the Regent Pacific Group and returned to Asia in 1999 as Managing Director of Regent’s Hong Kong office responsible for the portfolio management. Julian has a BSc in Economics from Bristol University.

Mark Chambers

Head of Sales Management, Europe, Man Investments

Biography

David Norman, known as DAN, began his career in financial services in 1986 as a direct salesman for London Life Association having originally trained as an industrial chemist. He held a number of senior sales and marketing roles in life and pensions companies ultimately specialising in asset management with Threadneedle Asset Management.

DAN was Managing Director of the Retail Business for Insight Investment and Director, Marketing and Products Morley (now Aviva Investors) before becoming the UK Chief Executive of Credit Suisse Asset Management.

He has recently established a new asset management business, TCF Investment, designed to bring ‘transparency, consistency and fairness’ to retail investors.

Karen Hamilton

Senior Product Manager, Global Fund Services, Northern Trust

Biography

Karen is product manager for the European fund sector of Northern Trust’s Global Fund Services. She holds responsibility for developing new products and services for investment managers across Europe and managing the impact of regulatory change on our clients and their investors.

Karen has a broad range of investment management administration service experience for UK and continental European clients. She has focused recently on the provision of a UCITS III vehicle in both Ireland and Luxembourg and the implementation of a strategic European transfer agency solution to support the distribution needs of our clients.

Prior to joining Northern Trust in 2004, Karen was a project manager in the investment manager solution team of Mellon European Financial Services, where she transferred from F&C Management in 2003 as part of the lift-out transaction. At F&C, Karen was responsible for managing relationships with appointed third party administrators and project managing client-focused initiatives and transitions.

Anne Richards

Chief Investment Officer, Aberdeen Asset Management

Biography

Anne Richards is Chief Investment Officer (CIO) and head of multi-asset investment at Aberdeen. Anne was Chief Investment Officer and joint managing director of Edinburgh Fund Managers, which was purchased by Aberdeen in 2003. Prior to joining EFM, Anne worked for Merrill Lynch Investment Managers and JP Morgan Investment Management. Anne began her career with the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN) in Geneva as a research fellow.

Anne is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment.

Lothar Mentel

Chief Investment Officer, Octopus Investments

Biography

Lothar is chief investment officer and at Octopus Investments. Prior to joining Octopus, Lothar held senior positions with Commerzbank Asset Management, Barclays Wealth, Threadneedle and NM Rothschild. He began his career in Germany as a performance and risk analyst and later designed and launched the Barclays Multi Manager funds. He joined Octopus in 2008 to build a multi-manager fund business, which has since grown to over £500m.

Lothar is a regular contributor to industry conferences, publications and industry body work-groups. He has over 16 years' investment management experience.

Lothar was educated in Germany and holds a postgraduate degree in Business and Economics.

Julian Mayo

Investment Director, Charlemagne Capital

Biography

Julian is Co-Head of Portfolio Advisory. He joined Charlemagne Capital in 2003 as Director of Charlemagne Capital (UK) Limited and a member of the portfolio advisory team. Julian has 25 years’ investment experience, most of which has been focused on emerging markets. Julian began his investment management career in Hong Kong with Schroders before joining Thornton Management (later Dresdner Thornton) in Hong Kong in 1985 as a fund manager. He opened Thornton’s Tokyo office in 1987, where he was responsible for North Asian stocks, before moving to London in 1991. After 11 years at Thornton, Julian joined the Regent Pacific Group and returned to Asia in 1999 as Managing Director of Regent’s Hong Kong office responsible for the portfolio management. Julian has a BSc in Economics from Bristol University.

Chris Taylor

Chief Executive Officer, Blue Sky Asset Management

Biography

Blue Sky Asset Management (BSAM) is an award winning UK based boutique investment firm specialising in structured investments for retail and institutional investors. The firm was established in 2007 by a team of directors with industry leading experience, gained through senior positions held in major banking and global asset management institutions, at the forefront of the structured investment industry.

Chris Taylor is Chief Executive at Blue Sky Asset Management. Chris is the former Director of UK Structured Products Distribution at HSBC Asset Management, and Managing Director of the Structured Investments Division at Dawnay Day Quantum. Along with fellow directors at BSAM, Chris has firm views about what has characterised the structured products industry in the past and what will define and differentiate the companies that aim to be successful in the future.

BSAM’s business ethos and approach is based upon developing 'intelligent investments', designed to maximise returns for investors, not 'easy products' designed to maximise sales for providers. The firm offers a non-prescriptive private banking style of approach and level of capability to high end wealth management specialists – including the scope to develop bespoke and exclusive investment solutions.

Industry awards gained by BSAM in 2008 include ‘Best in the UK’ and ‘Best Research Process’ and, notably, the firm is recognised for its emphasis in championing client-centric structured investments based upon investment quality, not sales quantity.

Dan Waters

Director of Conduct Risk and Sector Leader, Asset Management, Financial Services Authority

Biography

Dan Waters is the Director of Retail Policy & Conduct Risk and listed amongst his responsibilities is the Retail Distribution Review. Dan is also the FSA "Sector Leader" for asset management and is responsible for the FSA's overall strategy and liaison with the fund management industry. He is the UK's representative on the CESR Expert Group on Investment Management and IOSCO Standing Committee 5 on Investment Management.

Prior to his current role, Dan was Director of the FSA Regulatory Strategy and Risk Division, responsible for the FSA's strategic planning, risk management and assessment systems, performance measurement and risk analysis and research.

Dan was the FSA's first Director of Enforcement. He previously worked at the Investment Management Regulatory Organisation where he was Director of Monitoring and Enforcement, and at the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission where he was Head of International Enforcement Operations.

Robert Talbut

Chief Investment Officer, Royal London Asset Management

Biography

His career in asset management has seen him take on a wide variety of portfolio management roles of both a retail and institutional type nature. He has also advised many clients on their strategic asset allocation decisions as well as actively managing this for a number of funds. Throughout this time he has also been actively involved in issues of corporate governance as well as the workings of the capital markets.

Robert is Deputy Chairman of the ABI Investment Committee. He is also a member of the IOD, the Asset Management Committee of the Investment Management Association, of the Pre-Emption Group, Senior Practitioners Committee of the FSA and the Takeover Appeals Board.

Philip Warland

Head of Public Policy, Fidelity International

Biography

Philip has spent more than thirty years in the financial services industry. After spending over twenty years with the Bank of England including spells in the Governor’s office and as Chief Press Officer he went to Standard Chartered Bank as a Group Deputy General Manager.

After that he spent ten years as Director General of the UK’s asset management trade association, now the Investment Management Association. This gave him a detailed knowledge of the industry which he both used and added to from 2001 to 2006 when he was a Senior Adviser with the Investment Management practice of PricewaterhouseCoopers in London and Brussels.

In 2006 he joined the City headhunters Halsey Consulting, and in July 2009 was appointed to the new role of Head of Public Policy at Fidelity International.

Philip was the founder-chairman of the Oasis Charitable Trust in 1986. It operates with disadvantaged young people in eleven countries and is the sponsor of thirteen City Academies in the UK. He chaired the trust until 2006.