Jeremy Bennett

Chief Financial Officer

Jeremy Bennett is Chief Financial Officer at Funding Circle. He has more than three decades of experience within financial services, working for Credit Suisse — including acting as Head of European Fixed Income and Global Head of Structuring — before becoming CEO of Nomura in Europe, Middle East and Africa and CEO of Nomura International. During the financial crisis, Jeremy acted as a senior adviser to the Financial Services Authority and HM Treasury. He was responsible for designing the £800 billion Asset Protection Scheme that provided insurance to all UK banks in 2008 and became the first CEO of the Asset Protection Agency, created by HM Treasury to oversee the scheme. Jeremy has also acted as a senior adviser to HMT on the Vickers Commission recommendations, advising on the adoption, modification and implementation of new banking structures for the UK government, and was a board member at the British Bankers Association. Outside of financial services Bennett is heavily involved in the charity and social sector. He is Vice Chairman of the Disasters Emergency Committee and board member at the University of Oxford.

Darryl Bowman

Chief Marketing Officer

Darryl Bowman is Chief Marketing Officer at Funding Circle and is responsible for global marketing and brand. Prior to joining the team, Darryl held several senior positions at a number of successful internet companies across multiple industries. Darryl was responsible for global marketing for wonga.com, taking it from small start-up to a leading global brand. As well as senior roles at lastminute.com and more recently the healthtec company Babylon, he also led sales and marketing at Experian Interactive. Darryl started his career as a PR consultant specialising in consumer technology.

Pam Burton

UK Chief Operating Officer

Pam is responsible for operations at Funding Circle in the UK. Pam has extensive experience growing internet companies from start-up to the international level.

Prior to Funding Circle, she was Head of European Marketing Operations at LOVEFiLM where she was responsible for the operational delivery of acquisition marketing, partnership services and CRM strategy across Europe.

Samir Desai CBE

Co-founder, Chief Executive Officer

Samir is responsible for driving the company strategy, overseeing the company’s finances and managing the day-to-day operations at Funding Circle. Samir has worked extensively in the financial services sector.

Before founding Funding Circle, Samir was an Executive at Olivant, a private equity investor in financial services businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Prior to this, Samir was a management consultant at BCG advising a number of major UK and global banks and insurers on strategy, new product initiatives, and operational efficiency.

Christian Grobe

Co-founder, Continental Europe Chief Operating Officer

As CE COO, Christian responsible for overseeing the day-to-day operations of sales, credit and marketing at Funding Circle in Continental Europe. Prior to this, Christian was co-founder and CEO of Zencap, where he was responsible for sales, marketing, finance and HR. Before founding Zencap, Christian worked as project manager at McKinsey & Company for six years. Christian holds a university degree in economics (University of Heidelberg, Princeton University, USA) and a PHD in politics (FU Berlin).

Sam Hodges

Co-founder, U.S. Managing Director

As Co-Founder and U.S. Managing Director, Sam is responsible for overseeing the overall strategic direction and day-to-day operation of Funding Circle in the U.S. Under his leadership, the U.S. business has grown exponentially since its foundation in 2012 and has emerged as the world’s largest online marketplace exclusively focused on small business loans. He co-founded the company after seeing how hard it was to get a loan for a small business, a successful gym franchise, he helped build.

Before co-founding Funding Circle, Sam served as Vice President of Business Development at SecondMarket, the leading marketplace for alternative investments. There, Sam was responsible for corporate and business development and the company’s geographic expansion efforts. Sam was also part of the investment team at Pequot Capital, an $8 billion global fund manager, where he covered investments in financial technology and information services. He started his career as a strategy consultant at Katzenbach Partners, where he advised financial services and technology companies.

Sam currently serves on the boards of two private companies. He received his MBA and MS from Stanford University and graduated, magna cum laude, from Brown University.

Lisa Jacobs

Chief Strategy Officer

Lisa is responsible for strategy and corporate development at Funding Circle. Lisa develops Funding Circle’s strategy and business development, which includes international expansion, developing and launching new product propositions and incubating new business areas.

Prior to Funding Circle, Lisa worked independently as a business change consultant in the insurance industry and as a strategy consultant for the Boston Consulting Group. Whilst at the Boston Consulting Group, she 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. Lisa read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of Oxford.

Jerome Le Luel

Chief Risk Officer

Jerome Le Luel recently joined Funding Circle as Global Chief Risk Officer. His previous role was with Barclays where he headed up risk analytics globally across investment, corporate and retail banking, in charge of all statistical modelling, capital computation and quantitative analytics. Previously, Jerome was Chief Risk Officer for Barclaycard, the cards and payment business of Barclays, managing risk for a £40 billion lending portfolio across Europe, Africa and the US. Under his leadership at Barclaycard, the business doubled in size and tripled in profits despite the economic recession. Prior to that, Jerome spent 12 years with credit cards specialist Capital One, joining the Europe venture at start up stage and covering various leadership roles in risk, marketing and analytics.

James Meekings

Co‑founder, UK Managing Director

As co‑founder and UK Managing Director James leads the UK business and is responsible for overseeing the overall strategic direction and day‑to‑day operation of Funding Circle in the UK. James co‑founded Funding Circle in the UK in 2010 after seeing how difficult it was for small businesses to access funding and wanting to build something better.

Prior to Funding Circle James was at OC&C Strategy Consultants where he advised companies on strategy and growth across the retail, media and services sectors.

James has a first class Economics and Management degree from Oxford University.

Panni Morshedi

CE Managing Director

Panni is currently Managing Director at Funding Circle Continental Europe.

She brings 15+ years in building and scaling technology businesses. Most recently, Panni led Product Development at Wonga where, as a member of the founding team, was instrumental in launching Wonga and scaling it to a global consumer lender in three years, including developing the global platform, launching its international markets and building Wonga’s SME business.

Prior to joining Wonga, she was in charge of Product Development for iModel Music, a global mobile marketing company. Panni was also part of the founding team behind ExchangePath, a CMGI company based in New York. There she was responsible for developing the product, creating key partnerships, and driving its successful exit. Panni began her career as a management consultant and holds an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School in New York City.

Andrew Mullinger

Co-founder

Andrew is currently focused on a number of projects helping Funding Circle scale globally.

As a founder, Andrew has grown Funding Circle from an idea into the largest and fastest growing small business loan marketplace in the world. Andrew helped build out and lead the company’s operations before focusing on risk management. He was responsible for ensuring the performance of the first $1.5bn of loans originated globally has great risk adjusted returns for investors before handing over the reins to Jerome, our Global CRO.

Since Funding Circle entered the US in 2012, he has split his time between Funding Circle’s San Francisco and London offices.

Before founding Funding Circle, Andrew worked at Nomura and Citigroup specializing in regulatory and risk management. He also spent time at Ernst & Young as a consultant where he advised financial institutions, government and regulators on risk management and regulation, including a major UK bank on its SME credit models. Andrew holds a degree in Mathematics from Manchester University.

Lucy Vernall

General Counsel

Lucy is Global General Counsel, heading up Funding Circle’s legal function as well as UK compliance.

Lucy was one of the founder members of Kemp Little LLP, a technology focussed City law firm, where as 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, before joining Funding Circle in 2014.

David Yu

Chief Product Officer

As Global CPO, David is responsible for product, engineering and design at Funding Circle.

David has over 20 years of experience driving forward successful technology companies. Prior to Funding Circle, he spent more than a decade at Betfair where he held the roles of CTO, COO and then CEO of the world’s largest betting exchange. During his tenure as Betfair’s CEO, David was responsible for the overall business strategy and operations and grew revenues to over $600m by emphasizing the development of new products and spearheading the company’s geographic expansion.

David has also served as VP of International Engineering at AltaVista Company and Director of Engineering and Consulting Services at Zip2 (acquired by Compaq/AltaVista). He started his career as a software engineer.

David holds a MS degree in Computer Science from Stanford University and a BS degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from UC Berkeley.

Jörg Asmussen

Non-executive Director

Jörg Asmussen has held numerous high-profile positions, most recently as State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs within Germany. From 2012 to 2013, he assumed the role of Executive Board member of the European Central Bank, where he was in charge of monetary and financial policy. During this time, he focused on managing the repercussions of the European sovereign debt crisis and closely worked with countries including Greece, Spain and Portugal.

From 2008 to 2012, Jörg Asmussen was Germany’s Deputy Finance Minister and responsible for the German development bank KfW. During this time, he focused on market stabilisation and played a vital role in the establishment of the German bank rescue scheme Soffin/FMSA during the crisis. He has also spent time as the chairman of the German financial regulator BaFin.

Jeremy Bennett

Chief Financial Officer

Jeremy Bennett is Chief Financial Officer at Funding Circle. He has more than three decades of experience within financial services, working for Credit Suisse — including acting as Head of European Fixed Income and Global Head of Structuring — before becoming CEO of Nomura in Europe, Middle East and Africa and CEO of Nomura International. During the financial crisis, Jeremy acted as a senior adviser to the Financial Services Authority and HM Treasury. He was responsible for designing the £800 billion Asset Protection Scheme that provided insurance to all UK banks in 2008 and became the first CEO of the Asset Protection Agency, created by HM Treasury to oversee the scheme. Jeremy has also acted as a senior adviser to HMT on the Vickers Commission recommendations, advising on the adoption, modification and implementation of new banking structures for the UK government, and was a board member at the British Bankers Association. Outside of financial services Bennett is heavily involved in the charity and social sector. He is Vice Chairman of the Disasters Emergency Committee and board member at the University of Oxford.

Eric Daniels

Non-executive Director

Eric Daniels currently holds a range of business appointments which include Senior Adviser to CVC Capital Partners, Principal and Senior Adviser to StormHarbour, non-executive director of Russell Reynolds, Board Member of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Trustee of the Smithsonian UK Charitable Trust. He is also an advisor or board member for several innovative technology companies.

He was previously Group Chief Executive Officer of the Lloyds Banking Group, the FTSE 100 listed banking group, retiring in 2011. Prior to joining Lloyds in 2001, he spent 25 years with Citigroup in a range of management of positions in Panama, Argentina, Chile, the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States.

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

Samir Desai CBE

Co-founder, Chief Executive Officer

Samir is responsible for driving the company strategy, overseeing the company’s finances and managing the day-to-day operations at Funding Circle. Samir has worked extensively in the financial services sector.

Before founding Funding Circle, Samir was an Executive at Olivant, a private equity investor in financial services businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Prior to this, Samir was a management consultant at BCG advising a number of major UK and global banks and insurers on strategy, new product initiatives, and operational efficiency.

Andrew Learoyd

Chairman of the Board

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. Andrew is currently Chairman of Healthy Kids (trading as Little Dish in healthy food products for children) and Small World Group (a leading money transfer business in Europe).

Harry Nelis

Non-executive Director

Harry joined Accel in 2004 and invests in both early and late-stage Internet and software companies. He led Accel’s investments in, among others, Check24, an online price comparison service for consumer financial products in Germany; Gameforge, a developer and publisher of MMOGs; Kayak, an online search service for consumer travel; and Showroomprive, an online private sales club.

Before joining Accel, Harry was at Perry Capital, a $10 billion hedge fund, where he invested in public communications, media and technology companies. Prior to this, he was at Goldman Sachs, where he advised businesses on corporate finance and M&A transactions.

Harry spent the first decade of his career in Silicon Valley, where he founded E-motion, a venture-backed software company. He started his career at Hewlett-Packard, where he held various engineering positions. Harry is an active member of the World Economic Forum and serves on the Selection Committee of the WEF Technology Pioneers Programme. Harry holds an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School and a PhD and MS in Electrical Engineering from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Neil Rimer

Non-executive Director

Neil Rimer 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.

Neil’s current investment focus is on innovative solutions for energy and environmental problems. He is currently on the board of AlertMe, Fontself, doubleTwist, Lehigh Technologies, Moo Print, Netvibes, Photobox, Pulsic, Redwood Systems, Stack Exchange and Weatherbill.

Neil sponsored many of the firm’s investments including Betfair, Ofoto (now Kodak), Trolltech (now Nokia), Listen (now Real Networks), Numerical Technologies (now Synopsis) and Genmab (SDE: GNA). He has also served on the Board of Directors of U.C. Sampdoria, a football club competing in the Italian Serie A. Before starting Index Ventures, Neil spent four years with Montgomery Securities in San Francisco.

Bob Steel

Non-executive Director

Bob is a partner at Perella Weinberg Partners. Prior to joining Perella, Bob was New York City’s Deputy Mayor for Economic Development where he was responsible for the Bloomberg Administration’s economic development strategy and job-creation efforts.

As CEO of Wachovia Corporation in 2008, Bob oversaw the sale of the bank to Wells Fargo & Co. and served on the Wells Fargo board of directors until 2010. Bob has also served as the Under Secretary for Domestic Finance of the United States Treasury, Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs and a board member of Barclays.

Bob is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. He is Chairman of the Aspen Institute’s Board of Trustees and has served as Chairman of Duke’s Board of Trustees, Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, member of the FDIC Advisory Committee on Economic Inclusion, Chairman of The After-School Corporation, and Co-Founder of SeaChange Capital Partners.

Ed Wray

Non-executive Director

Edward Wray co-founded Betfair in 1999 with Andrew Black and was Chief Executive until 2003, when he moved to Australia to set up the company’s joint venture.

He became Chairman in 2006. Betfair floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2010, valued at £1.4bn. It is one of the world’s largest online sports betting operators, processing more than 5 million transactions a day. Prior to setting up Betfair, Edward spent 8 years at J.P. Morgan & Co. as a Vice President in the debt capital markets & derivatives area.