First Sentinel is a full-service corporate advisory and investment firm.

Brian has over 20 years’ experience in corporate finance, including direct investments and financing into companies, IPOs, capital raisings and mergers and acquisitions for both public and private companies. He has held board positions on several public and private companies throughout his career, most notably with Rangers Football Club, Allegiance Insurance and NQ Minerals. Brian has also held director and management positions with Zeus Capital, Allenby Capital, Noble & Company and Grant Thornton. He served as a Regulator for the Panel on Takeovers and Mergers, where he presided over 150 transactions, including many valued over £1bn.

Aimee Freeding has over 20 years’ experience in leading product and platform experiences for the world’s top technology firms. She has held R&D positions with firms such as Xbox, Microsoft, Oracle and Expedia. Aimee is a Founder of First Sentinel and an investor in the resource and tech sectors, with a special focus on AR, VR, Games, IoT and FinTech. She holds an MSc in Human Computer Interaction from the DePaul University School of Computer Science in Chicago.

Colin is a lawyer and banker with over 25 years’ experience. He is the Founder of the First Sentinel Advisory division and previously founded his own firm, On Demand Lawyers. Colin is principally based in our London office, but also spends some time in our representative office in Buenos Aires, where he is developing the Latin American market. He brings expertise from both the legal and financial arenas, having previously worked in-house at Coutts & Co. and UBS. Colin specialises in international investment structuring, corporate/commercial and corporate finance work for family offices, SMEs and listed companies. He also spent many years working in the creative industry and has a particular specialism in advising creative clients.

Shane is the Executive Director of First Sentinel Business Finance, having previously been CEO of the Australian invoice purchasing company Perennial Enterprises, which was acquired by First Sentinel in 2017. Under Shane’s growth strategy for the business, Perennial purchased over AUS $54 million in invoices in 2017.  Perennial had operated in the Debtor Finance sector for 20+ years in Sydney and was a strategic acquisition by First Sentinel PLC. Shane is also the Director of several private businesses in Australia. He served in the Royal Australian Navy with duties in Sydney and the Middle East.

Tom has over 30 years’ experience in managing small and medium sized enterprises. For the past decade, he has been the Group Finance Director of Advance Construction Group in Scotland, a company with a yearly turnover of around £160m and over 1,300 direct employees. Previously, Tom managed the MBO of Brownridge Plastics Ltd in England and became the Managing Director and Majority Shareholder. He sold the company in 2000. Tom has extensive experience in acquisitions, restructuring plans and MBOs.  He is also a qualified Chartered Management Accountant (ACMA).

Paolo acts as advisor to the board, bringing a wealth of corporate experience. He is currently CEO of Circle Health, a company he originally joined as Chief Financial Officer in November 2010. Prior to that he spent five years at lastminute.com, initially as UK Finance Director and subsequently as Managing Director of some European divisions, spearheading technological developments and transforming their financial performance from loss-making to profitability. Paolo also spent seven years within the Virgin organisation, three of which as Finance Director of Virgin Megastore. Paolo has a Bachelor of Accountancy from Glasgow University and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Accountants for Scotland.

Gabrielle advises clients on a range of corporate transactions, particularly IPOs, fundraisings and M&As, and provides day-to-day advice to listed companies on their continuing obligations. Gabrielle trained and qualified as a lawyer in 2009 at a leading corporate practice in Brazil. She later joined, as head of legal, a private equity firm of GP Investments focusing on infrastructure investments. Gabrielle also worked at Nestor Advisors, a London-based consultancy firm, where she advised clients across EMEA on corporate governance. Gabrielle is dual-qualified as an English solicitor and Brazilian lawyer. She has a master’s degree with distinction in Corporate Law from the London School of Economics and an MBA in Finance from Ibmec Business School, Brazil.

Christen is the Associate Director of First Sentinel Business Finance, having previously been a Director of the Australian invoice purchasing company Perennial Enterprises, which was acquired by First Sentinel in 2017. Christen leads the operations, accounting and auditing of First Sentinel Business Finance. She also serves as the Business Development Director for the business, focusing on new client acquisition and ensuring client satisfaction.

Natalia is a highly motivated compliance expert with over 15 years of in-house legal experience, including 8 years in the insurance sector working with Alllianz and Aon. She pivoted to the investment space and subsequently moved to London where she led the in-house compliance team for an investment firm for 4 years, before joining First Sentinel where she leads our compliance team and provides oversight on all business functions. Natalia holds an LL.B from Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie in Sao Paulo and an International MBA via a joint programme hosted by four universities across the Americas: FIA (Brazil), ITAM (Mexico), Simon Fraser University (Canada) and Vanderbilt University (USA). Natalia also acts as a professional mentor to graduates and undergraduates at City, University of London. She is fluent in both English and Portuguese.  

As Head of Investment, Jilly works closely with our high-net-worth clients and family offices to intelligently curate their investment portfolios. Prior to joining First Sentinel, Jilly was Head of Private Investment at Adelpha, where she specialised in the technology sector and in high-growth propositions. Jilly has a background in contemporary art and was previously the Managing Director of Bold Tendencies, a renowned sculpture gallery in South London. She started her career trading in equity derivatives for UBS. She is a graduate of Cambridge University, with a Starred First in Medical Sciences and Management Studies, and was a Frank Knox Fellow at Harvard University.

Issam has a background in venture capital and prior to joining us was Director of Innovation and Investments at Whitespace, a London-based innovation and venture lab, where he was responsible for establishing and maintaining the global investor network as well as on-boarding corporate partners and new start-up clients. As Head of Capital Markets, Issam manages relationships with all of the company’s funding and deal partners and oversees all stages of the deal cycle. His background in developing start-up companies and in strategic, operational and technical planning is invaluable to the SME clients we work with. He began his career as a financial analyst and has subsequently worked as an investment manager at venture capital and private equity funds across the MENA region and more recently as COO of a private family office. Issam holds an MBA from the Saïd Business school at Oxford University and a BSc in Economics from LSE.

Stan has worked in the city for over 30 years, having begun his career training at Henderson Crosthwaite straight after school as a Stock Exchange Dealer in the old open Market. He spent 20 years there before joining Brewin Dolphin, where he served as a Divisional Director running a portfolio desk. He was also the main dealer in football club shares, helping to build stakes in leading clubs. He then teamed up with Melvyn Marks at Bastion Capital where they looked after high-net-worth clients, trading European and US stocks through CFDs and Spread Bets.

Celia is responsible for managing First Sentinel’s business development and investor relations in the Asia-Pacific region, with a particular focus on the Chinese market. She has over six years of experience in connecting global SME companies with institutional and high-net-worth investors in China. In addition, she has had an extensive and successful media career with major Chinese broadcasters and international media corporations, working as a TV presenter and interviewer of high-profile political and business personalities.

Melvyn is an experienced market-maker who has worked in the City for over forty years. He learnt his trade at Smith Brothers where he spent 15 years, before moving across the market to the newly formed BZW. After 10 years at BZW, he then joined Nomura to head up the retail market making section, later joining Kleinwort Benson and then Bastion Capital. Melvyn has extensive experience in both the Short Sterling Futures market and in Equities. At First Sentinel, Melvyn services high-net-worth individual investors using CFDs and Spread Betting platforms in major US and European stocks.

Melisa is a Senior Associate and a highly skilled corporate lawyer. She qualified in Argentina, following her undergraduate degree in law at Universidad de Buenos Aires and post-graduate studies in Compliance and Criminal Liability of Legal Entities at Universidad Torcuato Di Tella. She brings a solid understanding of international, civil, commercial and business law to First Sentinel and before joining us was a Senior Associate at a law firm in Buenos Aires, advising both Argentinian and international companies on corporate transactions and business development. She is fluent in both English and Spanish.

Ana is an Associate at First Sentinel who specialises in corporate governance and corporate law. She has extensive experience as a lawyer in her native Brazil, where she worked primarily in-house across a diverse range of sectors, including oil and gas, mining, telecommunications and media. Ana holds an LLB from the Universidade Cândido Mendes. She qualified as a lawyer in 2007 and is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Commercial and Corporate Law at Queen Mary University of London. She is fluent in English and Portuguese.

Liza is a Senior Analyst who currently focuses on supporting our start-up clients, including fintech company Capable Finance and biotechnology venture Stabilitech Biopharma. She also has experience working in our Corporate Broking and Corporate Advisory divisions. She previously worked in portfolio management at BST Management Consulting and as a financial analyst at M&A Research Centre (MARC). Liza holds a first-class honours degree in Banking and International Finance from the University of London’s Cass Business School, where she was awarded an International Scholarship. Originally from St Petersburg, Liza is fluent in English, Russian and Finnish.

Floyd joined us straight after achieving his A-levels, forgoing a place at UCL (University College London) to immediately start his career and begin working towards becoming a chartered accountant. Floyd assists with a number of different aspects of our business, with his primary focus being fundraising and assisting with SME growth strategies en route to IPO. A keen rugby player, Floyd played for the first team at Brighton College and continues to play regularly.

Josefina is an analyst whose role at First Sentinel involves compiling documents for IPOs and stock exchange listings, maintaining company records, drafting and submitting companies’ statements, resolutions and memorandums to the relevant regulatory bodies, and drafting client agreements, mergers and acquisitions. Her professional background encompasses paralegal, senior payroll and project development roles in the engineering, healthcare and tax sectors in her native Argentina. Josefina holds a Bachelors in Economics and a Bachelors in Law from the University of Buenos Aires. She is fluent in English and Spanish.

Jenny is an analyst at First Sentinel. Her previous experience includes roles in accounting and project management in the banking and insurance sectors in her native China, as well as an Assistant to the Director role for an investment advisory company in Edinburgh.

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Management with a major in Accounting from the Chongqing University of Technology, and an MSc in Finance from the University of Sheffield. She is fluent in English and Mandarin.