Gresham House Energy Storage Fund plc

John is a highly-experienced international executive in the energy sector and an investor and advisor in renewable energy and digital technology. In his early career, John worked in civil nuclear power generation and held a number of senior roles at BP, focusing on the North Sea and Azerbaijan. Latterly at BP, he held a range of corporate-level executive roles, including Group Chief Information Officer.

He was also responsible for group-wide physical and cyber security and led the development of corporate digital transformation investment activity. John is currently a senior advisor to global blue-chip consultants specialising in energy and digitisation, a partner with donedeal (Monaco) – a boutique financial advisory and M&A house – and is on the board of cyber security firm Global Integrity. John also serves on the Enterprise Committee of the Royal Academy of Engineering.

Isabel’s career investing equity in infrastructure worldwide includes billion-dollar private funds for AIG in Asia, ABN AMRO in Europe and pension schemes in the UK.  She has served as a non-executive representing transport users across the UK and at Heathrow Airport. 

Isabel is also a director of Schroder Oriental Income Fund Limited and Utilico Emerging Markets Trust plc. Fluent in Mandarin Chinese, Isabel has an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, a Master in Public Policy from Harvard Kennedy School, and a BA in economics from the Ohio State University. She has worked in the US, Hong Kong, and for the last 20 years in London.

Duncan is a Chief Financial Officer and Finance Director with over 20 years’ public and private commercial experience. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and qualified with PwC in London. Duncan was part of the senior management team that turned Corona Energy from a gas trading business into the largest independent supplier of gas to UK businesses and has also served as CFO of an M&A team bidding for thermal power stations. Duncan is also a non-executive director and the Chair of the Audit Committee of Atrato Onsite Energy plc.

Recently he spent several years as Finance Director of Belltown Power, a renewable energy site operator (hydro, solar and wind) holding a portfolio of 215 MW. He is a Trustee of Cambodian Children’s Fund UK.

Cathy is a legal adviser who has specialised in the investment company sector for over 20 years. Cathy is currently a Partner at CMS, a top global law firm. Prior to this, she worked in the asset management practice of another top global law firm for almost 20 years, 8 of which as a Partner.

Cathy’s work has encompassed investment fund structuring and fundraising for domestic and international investment funds. Cathy is also a member of the Law Society Company Law Committee and sits on the Regulatory and Governance Committees of LPeC, the industry association for listed private capital funds.

David is a financial journalist and commentator for several leading publications, including The Financial Times, Citywire and MoneyWeek. He is Executive Director of leading alternative finance news and events service altfi.com, which covers major trends in marketplace lending, crowdfunding and working capital provision for SMEs. David is the author of a number of books, including a bestseller on ETFs and their use within portfolios in Europe for the FT.

David was a Director at The Rocket Science Group and before that a Senior Producer in business and science for BBC TV. He is also a Non-Executive Director on the SQN Secured Income Investment Trust and the Aurora Investment Trust.

Ben has been Managing Director and Head of the Gresham House New Energy division since November 2017.

He is the Fund Manager of Gresham House Energy Storage Fund plc, with assets under management (AUM) of over £500mn, and was, through 2020, also Fund Manager for the British Strategic Investment Fund (BSIF) strategy which grew AUM to £350mn under his leadership.

Ben started his fund management career at Lazard Asset Management in 1994 and worked there for nine years. He later founded Hazel Capital in April 2007, serving as Managing Partner and CIO and which became Gresham House New Energy on the acquisition of Hazel Capital’s business activities in November 2017.

Prior to founding Hazel Capital, he was a co-founder of Cantillon Capital, where he managed a US$1bn equity hedge fund focused on global technology, media and telecom.

Ben currently serves as a director of over 50, mostly project, companies.

He has 27 years of investment experience and holds a BEng in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College.

Rupert has been the Managing Director of Gresham House Asset Management Ltd since September 2015. He is a member of the Group Management and Investment Committees.

Rupert has a proven track record of delivering significant value to shareholders and has over 32 years’ experience in asset management, private banking and wealth management, focusing on product innovation, investment management, business development, banking and wealth structuring.

Before joining Gresham House, Rupert was CEO and CIO of Schroders (UK) Private Bank for 11 years, and spent 17 years at Rothschild, where latterly he was Head of Private Clients for Rothschild Asset Management.

Gareth has been an Investment Director at Gresham House since November 2017. He joined the company following the acquisition of Hazel Capital where he was a Partner. Gareth is responsible for executing investments, particularly acquisitions, disposals and limited recourse financings of pre-and-post commissioned renewables projects.

Prior to joining Hazel Capital, he worked at Barclays Capital from 2001 to 2009, latterly as a Vice President for Barclays Natural Resource Investments, a c.US$1.5bn captive private equity fund investing in natural resources and renewable energy. Prior to that, he worked in the Structured Capital Markets divisions of Barclays Capital and Deutsche Bank, handling the acquisition and disposal of various asset-based companies.

He started his career in infrastructure project finance at NatWest Markets, advising on and financing a number of Private Finance Initiative (PFI) / Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects.

Gareth has over 20 years of experience and holds an MBA from Imperial College Business School, an MSc in Engineering Project Management and a BEng in Civil Engineering, both from the University of Manchester.

Charlie is an Investment Director in the Gresham House New Energy team. His current role began in February 2021, following a year in the team as a contractor. He is responsible for executing investments in infrastructure projects such as energy storage systems, whether acquired before construction or when already operational.

Charlie has extensive experience in the development, funding and asset management of distributed energy infrastructure projects assisting both investment managers and project developers at every stage of bringing their projects to fruition. He has worked on projects in a wide range of technologies including solar PV, hydroelectric power, anaerobic digestion, combined heat and power, thermal heat networks, gas peaking and grid-scale battery storage.

He started his career over 20 years ago as a commercial solicitor before transitioning to renewable energy, working with investment management firms for the last nine years.

Charlie studied science of materials at Trinity College Dublin and has an MBA from INSEAD, France.

James is an Investment Manager at Gresham House. James moved to the New Energy team in 2019 after joining Gresham House in 2018 as part of Gresham House Ventures, having previously been at Livingbridge since 2016.

James’ current role covers a broad range of work across fund management and new investments, primarily focused on energy storage and renewables. Amongst other things he is responsible for modelling for the energy storage fund, both at fund level and for new investments drawing on his experience and understanding of BESS markets. Prior to joining the New Energy team, he worked as an Analyst covering mostly early-stage companies in the Venture Capital and Equity Fund vehicles as part of Gresham House Ventures. This role provided experience with investment decisions across a variety of markets as well as exposure to growth companies and management of quoted investment vehicles.

His career started in TMT audit at EY where he spent three years and qualified as a chartered accountant.

James holds a first-class Master’s degree in Mathematics from Durham University.