Building the place where small businesses get the funding they need to win

Lisa is CEO of Funding Circle. She is responsible for driving the company’s strategy and overseeing Funding Circle's operations in the UK and US. Lisa joined Funding Circle in 2012 and was previously UK Managing Director, responsible for the overall strategic direction and day‑to‑day operation of Funding Circle UK. She has also previously held the role of Chief Strategy Officer, where she was responsible for developing and launching new product propositions and incubating new business areas. She led Funding Circle’s entry into the US and Continental Europe through acquisition. She led a number of fundraisers for the business and was part of the core team behind Funding Circle’s admission to the London Stock Exchange in 2018.

Prior to Funding Circle Lisa worked as a consultant, both independently and for the Boston Consulting Group. She has advised national and multinational companies, from a variety of industries, on strategic and operational initiatives covering growth, new product development, reorganisation and transformation, amongst others. In addition, she has worked for NGOs in Tanzania and India.

Alexander leads the UK business and is responsible for the strategic direction and overall performance of Funding Circle in the UK. Alexander joined Funding Circle in early 2018 as UK Strategy Director, before also taking on the roles of Commercial Director and then also Change Director with responsibility for driving commercial performance across the UK business, setting strategic plans, developing and launching new product propositions and managing programme delivery. He has also had spells leading the Marketing, Brand and Operations teams in the UK and Europe.

Prior to Funding Circle, Alexander began his career at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, before going on to serve 7 years as a commissioned officer in the Royal Green Jackets/The Rifles. Since leaving the army he has worked in several roles including 4½ years with Bain & Company in London, advising a number of multinational companies across financial services, utilities, business information, health and education. His specialisms included corporate and business unit strategy, organisational and op model design, salesforce effectiveness and performance improvement. He has also held leadership roles in working with NGOs in Haiti and building a retail services business in the UK and Ireland.

Alexander holds an MA (Oxon) from the University of Oxford and an MBA from INSEAD.

As the U.S. Managing Director, Steve is responsible for leading Funding Circle's efforts to connect small businesses with the funding they need to grow and succeed. With over 20 years of experience in the financial industry, Steve brings a wealth of knowledge and expertise to the company.

Prior to joining Funding Circle, Steve held senior positions at several global financial institutions including Wells Fargo, Lending Club and BlueVine, where he gained a reputation for driving growth and delivering results. He has a proven track record of success and a deep understanding of the lending industry.

Steve earned his MBA from Northwestern University and his BA in economics from Washington and Lee University. He is passionate about supporting small businesses and is committed to helping Funding Circle U.S. build the place where small businesses get the financing they need to win.

As Global CFO, Oliver serves on the Funding Circle Holdings plc Board and is responsible for all aspects of finance including the statutory accounts, tax, treasury and procurement.

Oliver joined from Vanquis Bank where he served as Chief Financial Officer. He was formerly the Chief Financial Officer at Barclaycard, where he managed a global business with combined assets of £40bn, £5bn of revenues and £1.6bn of profits. Oliver is a chartered management accountant and holds an MBA from Warwick Business School.

As Chief Technology Officer, Greig is responsible for all of Funding Circle's technology capabilities globally.

Greig is a customer-driven technology leader, with more than twenty years' experience working in fast-paced digital organisations. He has served as CTO for businesses as diverse as sennder, one of Europe's leading digital freight-forward platforms, and both the Paddy Power and Betfair brands.

Greig also has extensive experience in leading change delivery and transformation for companies such as Ladbrokes and Yell. He started his career as a developer for the National House Building Council.

Greig holds a Masters Degree from Glasgow University.

Lucy is responsible for the Legal, Compliance and People functions of the business. She is also the Company Secretary for the plc. Lucy joined in 2014 and oversaw the process for full Financial Conduct Authority authorisation of the UK regulated business. In addition to working on the acquisition of Funding Circle’s European business in October 2015 and a number of capital raises—including a £82m investment round in January 2017—she was part of the core team working on the October 2018 listing of Funding Circle Holdings on the London Stock Exchange. Lucy took on responsibility for the People function in August 2019.

Lucy was one of the founder members of Kemp Little LLP, a technology focused City law firm, whereas head of corporate she worked on M&A, equity and debt financing for financial services and fintech companies. She was managing partner of Kemp Little from 2009 to 2011 when she became Wonga’s first General Counsel and built up the company’s international legal team.

Jerome leads FlexiPay and is responsible for building and growing this business at pace.

He brings more than 20 years of experience in both the fintech and banking sectors, having worked in product and commercial leadership roles with both high growth scale-up organisations and established large enterprises globally. Most recently, Jerome built and led Product teams at global fintech organisations, Remitly and Revolut. Prior to that, he held various commercial leadership roles to scale consumer lending products at Sainsbury’s Bank and Citi’s global consumer business. Jerome began his career in consultancy with Deloitte and Accenture, advising financial institutions and consumer goods companies on growth and operational programmes. Jerome holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management.

Belkacem brings more than 20 years of experience in risk management to his role as Global Chief Risk Officer at Funding Circle, following 5 years as Chief Risk Officer for Europe.

Prior to joining Funding Circle, Belkacem held various risk leadership roles within GE Capital across Asia and Europe at both a regional and national level. He has unique international experience across credit cycles with a deep knowledge of most consumer and retail commercial lending products. Within Funding Circle, his leadership during the Covid crisis has been critical in ensuring that SMEs continued to be supported through the pandemic whilst protecting investor returns.

Samir founded Funding Circle and launched the business in 2010. He was CEO until the end of 2021 when he stepped down and transitioned to a Non-Executive role on the Board. In 2015, Samir was awarded a CBE for services to financial services. Prior to Funding Circle, Samir was a consultant at BCG and an investment executive at Olivant focused on financial services businesses. Funding Circle is a global lending platform where investors lend directly to small businesses in the UK, US, Germany and the Netherlands. Funding Circle has originated £13.1 billion+ of loans to 118,000+ businesses creating an estimated 135,000 jobs. Investors on the platform include institutional investors, local councils and government organisations including the British Business Bank, KFW (German state development bank) and the European Investment Bank. Funding Circle is one of the best capitalised platforms globally and listed on the London Stock Exchange (Ticker: FCH) in October 2018.

Helen has over 25 years of experience in financial services, particularly in remuneration design, regulation and human resources. Helen was formerly a partner at Deloitte and, among her previous roles in her career, Helen was Global Head of Reward at Standard Bank, Head of McLagan Europe (part of Aon) and held roles in human resources in Fidelity International.

Helen serves as Non-Executive Director of Ashmore Group PLC (where she is Chair of the remuneration committee), Governor of University of Bedfordshire, Governor of John Whitgift Foundation and independent member of the remuneration committee for The British Olympic Committee.

Eric currently holds a range of business appointments which include as an advisor, a mentor, a non-executive director, a trustee or a board member. He also advises several innovative technology companies.

Eric was previously Group Chief Executive Officer of the Lloyds Banking Group retiring in 2011. Prior to joining Lloyds in 2001, he spent 25 years with Citigroup in a range of management positions.

Eric holds a Master of Science in Management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Arts in History from Cornell University.

Geeta has over 25 years of experience of financial services and retail banking, particularly payments and digital innovation. She was formerly executive Chair of Monitise Europe. Among the many roles in her financial services career, Geeta was Director of Payment Services with HBOS plc and previously Managing Director, UK Retail Bank and Business Development Head EME at Citigroup. She is a chartered accountant.

Geeta serves as Non-Executive Director of Virgin Money UK PLC (where she is chair of the risk committee and on the audit committee), Wizink Bank SA (where she is chair of the risk committee and a member of the audit committee) and Ultra Electronic Holdings plc.

Matthew has over 36 years of experience of financial services. Having qualified as a solicitor with Slaughter and May, Matthew held a number of risk management positions with HSBC over a 15 year period across Asia, Australia, the Americas and Europe. Matthew is currently a Non-Executive Director of Prodigy Finance Limited, which provides funding to international students at over 750 universities and colleges worldwide and he is Non-Executive Chairman of Savannah Resources plc, an AIM-listed mining and exploration company which is developing a lithium mine in Portugal and a mineral sands mine in Mozambique.

Andrew spent 23 years working in investment banking as a research analyst in corporate finance, equity capital markets and finally as COO of the Equities Division in Europe of Goldman Sachs. He retired as a Managing Director of Goldman Sachs in 2006; since then he has been involved as an angel investor, Non-executive Director and consultant to several start-up businesses.

Harry joined Accel in 2004 and focuses on software, fintech and consumer internet companies.

Harry led Accel’s investments in KAYAK (NASDAQ: KYAK; acquired by Priceline), Showroomprive (EPA: SRP), Funding Circle (LON: FCH), CHECK24, WorldRemit, Celonis, and Instana.

Harry started his career in Silicon Valley as an engineer at Hewlett-Packard before founding a venture-backed software company.

Harry is from the Netherlands and graduated from Harvard Business School and Delft University of Technology.

Neil is a co-founder and Partner of Index Ventures. In 1992, Neil started the venture capital activity of Index’s predecessor firm, later co-founding Index Ventures and raising the firm’s first fund in 1996. Before starting Index Ventures, Neil spent four years with Montgomery Securities in San Francisco.

Neil is currently a director or observer on various boards of companies based in the UK, Europe and US including Prodigy Investments Limited, Raisin GmbH, Peat GmbH, Nexthink SA and Pitch Software GmbH. He is also a Director of Human Rights Watch.

Lucy is responsible for the Legal, Compliance and People functions of the business. She is also the Company Secretary for the plc. Lucy joined in 2014 and oversaw the process for full Financial Conduct Authority authorisation of the UK regulated business. In addition to working on the acquisition of Funding Circle’s European business in October 2015 and a number of capital raises—including a £82m investment round in January 2017—she was part of the core team working on the October 2018 listing of Funding Circle Holdings on the London Stock Exchange. Lucy took on responsibility for the People function in August 2019.

Lucy was one of the founder members of Kemp Little LLP, a technology focused City law firm, whereas head of corporate she worked on M&A, equity and debt financing for financial services and fintech companies. She was managing partner of Kemp Little from 2009 to 2011 when she became Wonga’s first General Counsel and built up the company’s international legal team.

As Global CFO, Oliver serves on the Funding Circle Holdings plc Board and is responsible for all aspects of finance including the statutory accounts, tax, treasury and procurement.

Oliver joined from Vanquis Bank where he served as Chief Financial Officer. He was formerly the Chief Financial Officer at Barclaycard, where he managed a global business with combined assets of £40bn, £5bn of revenues and £1.6bn of profits. Oliver is a chartered management accountant and holds an MBA from Warwick Business School.