People

Partner

Dominic Ward

Prior to co-founding Lepe Partners, Dominic worked at the Wellcome Trust where he was Co-Head of Direct Investments within the Trust's Investments Division. The Trust is the largest charitable endowment in Europe and had $25 billion of assets under management.

Whilst at the Trust, he formed the Direct Investments team and was responsible for sourcing, execution and management of direct private equity investments, which accounted for approximately $2 billion of assets under management.

Prior to working at the Wellcome Trust Dominic worked for Jones Lang LaSalle Corporate Finance, a boutique European corporate finance house, where he focused on mergers and acquisitions and financing transactions in the real estate industry.

Dominic is currently a non-executive director of Verne Holdings, which is a market leading data centre company. He is also a qualified chartered surveyor.

Partner

Jonathan Goodwin

Jonathan Goodwin is the founding partner of Lepe Partners, a merchant bank focused on entrepreneurs in the digital media sector. Prior to starting Lepe Partners in March 2011, Jonathan founded LongAcre Partners in August 2000 with Julian Culhane. LongAcre Partners advised clients including Friends Reunited on its sale to ITV plc, Celador (Who Wants To Be A Millionaire) on its sale to Endemol and uSwitch on its sale to EW Scripps. LongAcre Partners was sold to Jefferies & Co. in June 2007 where Goodwin served as the firm’s Global Head of Media & Internet Investment Banking for three years.

In 2003, Jonathan co-founded the Founders Forum with Brent Hoberman and in 2009 co-founded PROfounders Capital with Brent Hoberman and Michael Birch, a venture capital fund for digital entrepreneurs backed by entrepreneurs.

Previously, Jonathan was in the Media team at Apax Partners and later joined the MBI team of Talk Radio, backed by News Corporation and Liberty Media, which became the foundation for The Wireless Group plc, where Jonathan became Group Managing Director.

Partner

Julian Culhane

Prior to co-founding Lepe Partners, Julian was a Managing Director in the Global Mergers & Acquisitions Group of Jefferies with a specific focus on Media and Internet transactions. Prior to which, he was Head of European Media Investment Banking at Jefferies.

Prior to its acquisition by Jefferies in 2007, Julian was one of the founding Partners of LongAcre Partners where he helped build the company into Europe’s leading mid-market media corporate finance house.

Previously, Julian was the Chief Financial Officer of lastminute.com plc where he managed 3 rounds of private equity fundraisings and led the dual listing of the company on the London Stock Exchange and NASDAQ in 2000.

Julian is a qualified chartered accountant (PWC).

Partner

James Hill

James has 10 years’ experience in mergers & acquisitions and fundraising in the media and digital media sectors. Notable recent transactions include advising: LBi on its announced sale to Publicis; the shareholders of Netretail on the sale to Naspers; Exponent on its acquisition of  BBC Magazines from BBC Worldwide; and Montagu on their acquisition of CAP from Top Right Group (formerly EMAP).

Prior to joining Lepe Partners, James worked at Jefferies as a Director in the Media Team and latterly in the Global Mergers & Acquisitions Team where his focus was on the TMT Sector across Europe. Before this James was one of the members of LongAcre Partners which was sold to Jefferies & Co. in 2007.

Previously, James worked at Cazenove in the TMT Corporate Finance & Broking team where his clients included Capital Radio, Carlton, EMI, Pearson and Taylor Nelson.

James is a qualified Chartered Accountant (PricewaterhouseCoopers) and an Economics graduate from Warwick University.

Partner

Nick Bell

Nick has 16 years experience as one of the top ranked City analysts covering the media sector. Ten of those years were spent at Bear Stearns where he was Senior Managing Director heading European media research, and he held similar roles firstly at SBC Warburg Dillon Read and then latterly at Jefferies International. He has worked in a lead capacity on IPO’s, secondary placements and corporate transactions for a number of high profile companies within the sector.  

Prior to becoming an equity analyst, Nick worked in the media sector on a start-up venture in B2B publishing (later sold to Informa Plc) and also consulted to the Economist Group on special projects. He was also at Citibank for several years within the fixed-income division where he progressed to running a long-short bond fund.

 Nick has an MBA from Insead.

Partner

Romain Gonthier

Prior to joining Lepe Partners, Romain was a private equity investor at Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS), a sector focused mid-market investment fund with $3 billion of assets under management.  Whilst at VSS, he focused on investments in the digital media, information and education sectors.

Before joining VSS in 2008, Romain was a senior banker in the Jefferies Technology & Media investment banking team in London where he completed more than thirty M&A, LBO, and IPO transactions across a broad range of sectors including digital media, mobile, fintech, software and SaaS.

Prior to Jefferies, Romain held operational responsibilities in Silicon Valley, California, first with wireless telecom provider ArrayComm Inc and subsequently with voice-over-IP service provider Pagoo Inc. which he co-founded in 1998.

 A dual Swiss and French national with an MBA degree from Insead, Romain speaks English, French, Spanish and German.

Advisor

Anil Hansjee

Until June 2011, Mr Hansjee was the Head of M&A for Google EMEA, where he led deals worth over $230m over a five year period from 2006. In 2002, Mr. Hansjee joined IDG Ventures as a venture partner, where he had board seats with a number of high profile startups and early stage companies.

Prior to IDG Ventures, Mr Hansjee, was a derivatives engineer and a technology investment banker in Chicago, NYC and London with UBS, Chase and Bear Stearns. Mr Hansjee is currently an Advisor to the private equity funds EQT, MCI (Poland) and Creandum (Sweden).

In 2011, Mr. Hansjee received an Honorary Doctorate in Computing for services to IT entrepreneurship from Kingston University where he also was a visiting Professor. He is also an active policy advisor to the British Computer Society and a UK Government "techcity" champion.

Advisor

Brent Hoberman

Mr. Hoberman is co-founder of PROfounders Capital, which he founded in 2009 with Jonathan Goodwin and Michael Birch and is an early stage fund backed by entrepreneurs for digital entrepreneurs.

Mr Hoberman is currently chairman of mydeco.com, which he founded in 2009 and is the UK’s leading interior design website and has just launched in the US. Mr Hoberman is also currently chairman of made.com, which he founded in 2009 and is a direct from factory consumer homewares retailer based in the UK.

In 1998, Mr. Hoberman co-founded lastminute.com. He was CEO from inception and led the company to profit and gross bookings of over $2bn. In 2005 lastminute.com was sold to Sabre for $1.1bn.

Mr Hoberman is a Governor of the University of the Arts College, London and a non-executive director of the Guardian Media Group, TalkTalk plc and Time Out Group. He is also a YGL.

Advisor

Johnny Hornby

In June 2001, Mr. Hornby co-founded Clemmow Hornby Inge, now CHI&Partners, with Simon Clemmow and Charles Inge which has British Gas, Nestle, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lexus, Carphone Warehouse, The Times, Samsung & Britvic on the client list, and has been awarded Agency of the Year at BTAA, been Marketing's Agency of the Year, and is now a top 10 UK agency.

In 2007, WPP took a minority stake in CHI and together with Group M launched MCHI - a new model media company that now has over 120 million in billings.

In 1998, Mr. Hornby moved to TBWA and was responsible for winning and running the campaign that saw Labour to a second landslide victory in 2001.

In 1990, Mr. Hornby began as a trainee at Ogilvy & Mather advertising.

Mr. Hornby is also a Trustee of the English Heritage Foundation, a non-executive director for Mobile Money Network and a Governor of Marlborough College.

Team

Alex Polis

Alex joined Lepe Partners in July 2012 after obtaining a Master in Finance from IE Business School. He previously graduated with a BA in Economics from McGill University in 2011. During his education Alex completed two work placements at Statistics Canada in Ottawa. Alex has also completed an additional work placement in Montreal for Accenture and worked in political fundraising in New York City for a Congressional campaign.

Team

Benjamin Leaver

Prior to joining Lepe Partners in 2012, Benjamin was an Associate in the Media & Internet Investment Banking group at Jefferies International, having previously been an Analyst at LongAcre Partners.

At Jefferies, Benjamin completed a number of transactions, including Shine Group’s acquisition of Reveille, VSS’ acquisition of Clarion Events, e-Rewards’ acquisition of ResearchNow and Privalia’s €70m fundraise from General Atlantic and Index Ventures.

Prior to working at LongAcre Partners, Benjamin worked in Risk Management and Internal Audit at Fidelity Investments.

In April 2011, Benjamin left Jefferies to pursue an MBA at IE Business School in Madrid, from where he graduated in May 2012. He graduated from the University of Manchester with a BA in History in 2005.

Team

Furhaan Khan

Furhaan joined Lepe Partners in 2012 from Citigroup where he was in their Investment Banking team in London, covering clients across the Telecoms, Media and Technology space. During his time at Citigroup, he advised on M&A, Leveraged Finance and Capital Market transactions. Prior to working at Citi, he was at KPMG in the Transactions and Restructuring division, where he was involved with a number of complex insolvencies and restructuring mandates. He is a Chartered Accountant (ICAEW) and holds a BSc from University College London.

Team

Hadrien de Croy Roeulx

Prior to joining Lepe Partners in 2011, Hadrien was an Associate at Putnam Investments, a large US-based mutual fund company. Whilst there, he first supported the Chief Investment Officer and the Director of Operations. Later he joined the Investment Division and the Global Natural Resource team where he covered metals, mining and chemical stocks globally. In this role, he reported directly to the Portfolio Manager of the GNR fund, which has AUM of $400 million.

Prior to working at Putnam Investments, Hadrien worked in China as a Business Analyst for Adaltis Inc., a publicly traded Biotech company. In this role, he supported the newly appointed CEO and was involved in coordinating sales forecasts, raising capital, and working with all departments in the process of transferring activities to China. Hadrien holds a Master of Finance from the McCallum Graduate School of business at Bentley University (Boston, USA)

Team

Hattie Davis

Hattie joined Lepe Partners in 2011 as PA to Jonathan Goodwin. Hattie has over 7 years’ experience as a PA and EA as well as experience of working in travel and property. Hattie studied History of Art at Oxford Brooks University and is also a qualified milliner.

Team

Inigo Glenn

Inigo is a founding member of the Lepe Partners team. Prior to Lepe Partners he was part of the Media & Internet Investment Banking group at Jefferies International, having previously been at LongAcre Partners, prior to its sale to Jefferies.

During his time spent at Jefferies and LongAcre Partners, Inigo worked on a number of completed transactions across the Media & Internet space including LBi’s merger with bigmouthmedia, the sale of Chrysalis to BMG/KKR, the restructuring of Gallery Media Group’s $175m Senior Secured Notes and the recapitalisation of FastBooking.com.

Most recently, Inigo worked on the Zoopla/DPG merger, the sale of KelkooSelect to Time Out and Wahanda’s £3.5m investment round led by Fidelity.

Inigo is a graduate of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and the Ecole Supérieure de Commerce de Grenoble with a BA in International Business.

Team

John Wren

John joined Lepe Partners in 2011 after media experience at OMD in New York, where he analysed emerging technologies’ viability as an advertising medium. John also previously worked in Washington, D.C. as an analyst for the lobbying and communications firm Clark & Weinstock. John holds two Bachelor’s degrees from Boston College in Economics and History and a Masters in International Relations from Queen Mary.

Team

Rebecca Maxwell

Rebecca joined Lepe Partners earlier this year as Private assistant to Jonathan Goodwin. She previously worked in the sports industry in events and also is a qualified Personal Trainer. Rebecca graduated from the University of Exeter in 2008 with a BSc Hons degree in Exercise and Sport Sciences.

Team

Sarah Chapman

Having worked as PA to Jonathan Goodwin for 4 years at Jefferies, Sarah joined Lepe Partners as assistant to Dominic Ward. Previously, Sarah worked as a PA on the trading floors of Deutsche Bank and Merrill Lynch, in between travelling the world. Sarah studied French at Reading University, which included a year at the Sorbonne in Paris.