We are proud of our team. The wealth of knowledge and experience they bring is used to best represent our clients in today’s market.

Mark Ansell
Non-Executive Chairman
Mark is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and was a senior partner in practice for 20 years before leaving to deal with the public listing of a professional football club where he became Finance Director and Deputy CEO. In recent years he has had a portfolio of interests in public and private companies and currently (in addition to chairing Arden) chairs two private companies and carries out other one-off consultancies from time to time.
Mark brings extensive experience of management, fund raising, mergers and acquisitions and public listing together with a technical background in finance and controls.

Theo Bache
Research Analyst
Prior to joining Arden Theo worked at Liontrust within the Global Equity Team as a Senior Analyst focussing on technology. There he worked on the Global Technology Fund as well as advising on the sector across 19 equity funds. He has also worked in an electric aviation venture capital fund and in a technology consultancy which served SMEs and multinationals.

Donald Brown
Chief Executive Officer
Donald is a senior investment banking executive with over 25 years’ experience of working in the small cap and mid cap broking sector. Most recently he was a Managing Director at the Royal Bank of Canada and previously held senior positions at Collins Stewart and Evolution Securities. He has specialist knowledge of fundraisings at primary and secondary levels and many years’ experience of advising CEOs and boards across a wide range of industries, on corporate strategies within public and private markets.

Samantha Cook
Director of Compliance
Samantha has worked in the investment industry for 22 years. Starting in an operations role at James Capel and then qualifying as an Investment Advisor at Charles Stanley, Samantha progressed to the role London Branch Manager at Hargreave Hale, managing an office of Fund Managers, Investment Managers and dealers.
Samantha joined Arden in 2018 and is a Chartered Member (FCSI) of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investments, having achieved the full Private Client Investment Advice & Management diploma.

Ben Cryer
Corporate Finance Director
Ben joined Arden in 2015 following 6 years at KPMG during which time he worked in the Capital Markets Group advising on the UK listing process for AIM and the Main Market. Ben’s experience also includes conducting detailed due diligence on both public and private transactions.

Alistair Currie
Non-Executive Director
Alistair has been a fund manager specialising in UK Smaller Companies for almost 30 years. He is a graduate of Business Studies and Accounting from the University of Edinburgh and subsequently qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG in 1985. He was formerly a Director of Edinburgh Fund Managers plc and was the Head of UK Smaller Companies for that group. He joined Castlefield Investment Partners in 2007, becoming a partner in September 2009, and has been the lead manager of the Castlefield UK Smaller Companies Fund since April 2007. He also manages a number of funds investing in companies quoted on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) for the purpose of inheritance tax planning. Alistair is also a Director of Capital for Colleagues plc, an investment company focused on the Employee Owned Business sector.

Tim Dainton
Head of Distribution
Tim began his career in 1987 at Aetna Investment Management as an investment analyst, initially specialising in natural resources, before moving onto financial and property stocks. In 1990 he became an assistant fund manager on the UK Smaller Companies desk. In 1993 Tim joined the smaller companies team at Natwest Investment Management which, a few years later, merged with Gartmore to form one of the largest fund management companies in London. Tim spent a decade working with one of the most successful smaller companies teams in London before joining Peel Hunt as an equity salesman. He also spent time working in equity sales for Credit Suisse and Royal Bank of Canada before joining Arden in May 2017 as Head of Equity Sales & Research. Tim is a member of the Securities Institute and the Quoted Companies Alliance.

Steve Douglas
Group Finance Director and Company Secretary
Steve has spent 20 years in the City primarily as an adviser to small and mid cap companies. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and a Chartered Member of the Securities Institute.
Steve joined Arden in 2004 and was Head of Corporate Finance for 5 years ending in Autumn 2018. He began his career with Deloitte & Touche. He has also worked at Arbuthnot Securities (in the Corporate Finance team), Britannic PLC and Tarmac plc in corporate development.

Dan Gee-Summons
Associate Director, Corporate Finance
Dan joined Arden Partners in September 2017 having started his career at KPMG in Deal Advisory and Audit roles. Dan is a chartered accountant and has experience working on M&A, advisory and due diligence engagements with both public and private companies.

Marcus Gehling
Trade Support Manager
Marcus joined Arden at its inception in 2002 and has a wealth of knowledge and experience of Back Office operations and settlement processes. Prior to Arden, Marcus was with Albert E Sharp.

Rob Goodall
Director, Wealth Management
Rob has over 20 years’ experience working in international financial markets, having started his career trading futures and options on the LIFFE market.
Before joining Arden, Rob worked in a senior Sales Trading role at ED&F Man Capital Markets covering both corporate and UHNW investors. Prior to that he helped establish and run the Equity Derivative Sales Trading desks at two institutional brokerages. Rob has an in-depth knowledge of the CFD market, having run the CFD trading desk at Cantor Fitzgerald for more than five years.

Norman Gould
Director of Compliance
Norman has over 30 years of experience working in the City, 20 years of which has been specialising in compliance. He joined Arden in 2011 and is an FCCA and Chartered Fellow of the CISI. He was previously Director of Compliance at Piper Jaffray.

Paul Hart
Finance Director
Paul, an FCCA, qualified as an accountant in 2004 and has worked in various Financial Services roles throughout the world including Bermuda, Jersey and Sweden. Joining Arden in 2011, Paul is the Finance Director.

Manjot Heer
Graduate Analyst, Equity Research
Manjot completed his studies at King’s College London, with a focus on behavioural economics, and has a passion for renewable energy. He has experience working for KCL Entrepreneurship Institute with a focus on helping aid several tech ventures, and as an Analyst for NatWest Markets.

Richard Johnson
Corporate Finance Director
Richard is an experienced corporate financier specialising in small & midcap growth companies on the UK public markets, with a focus on AIM. He joined Arden in 2019, having previously worked for over 20 years at Shore Capital, Stockdale Securities and its predecessors.

Simon Johnson
Head of Corporate Broking
Simon has been advising smaller companies for over 20 years, starting at Ernst & Young in mergers and acquisitions before acting as a nominated adviser to AIM companies and then in 2004 he made a move to equity sales joining the sales desk at Charles Stanley. Simon worked in equity sales at the Royal Bank of Canada for five years where he first worked with other senior members of Arden. Simon joined Arden in 2018 from finnCap where he had led the Corporate Broking team for 7 years.

Aimee Kerslake
Equity Sales Executive
Prior to joining Arden in January 2019, Aimee has four years experience supporting private client fund managers at Ruffer LLP and a BA Honours degree in English Literature and Language.

John Llewellyn-Lloyd
Director, Corporate Finance – Head of Professional Services
John joined Arden from BESI/Execution Noble in 2015, bringing over 25 years of corporate finance experience including senior roles at Hill Samuel and Close Brothers.
Having run and built people businesses for many years, since 2008 John has focused on advising professional service businesses with a particular emphasis on fundraising and M&A. At Arden he leads the development of our sector specialisation in this area.

Ruari McGirr
Joint Head of Corporate Finance
Ruari joined Arden Partners in March 2017. He qualified as a chartered accountant and has worked in small and mid-cap advisory and broking for more than 20 years. Ruari has also worked in early stage technology companies and in Switzerland and Singapore.

John McGoldrick
Director, Wealth Management
John has a degree in Financial Economics and over 20 years’ experience gained in the City of London.
He has an extensive knowledge of the Institutional Investment Market and Wealth Management and manages a diverse client base ranging from Institutions, Family Offices/Trusts and High Net Worth Individuals with a focus on Absolute Returns, via strategies encompassing Equities, Fixed Income (including Convertible Bonds), and Funds/Investment Structures.
Joining the Arden wealth team in 2017, John actively trades in the UK, European and North American Equity/Fixed Income markets.

Philip Modu
Graduate Analyst, Equity Research
Philip joined Arden in 2020 as a Graduate Analyst in the Equity Research Team. Prior to joining Arden, he spent 2 years working as a Business Analyst at Northern Trust before obtaining his MSc in Finance & Management from the University of St Andrews in 2019.

John Peat
Director, Equity Sales
After reading Jurisprudence at Oxford, John joined the Private Client department of Montagu Loebl Stanley before moving to the Institutional desk of L Messel which ultimately was bought by Lehman Brothers. He then went on to work for Morgan Stanley, Collins Stewart, Seymour Pierce and Daniel Stewart before joining Arden Partners in June 2017 as an Equity Sales Director.

Mark Pilcher
Director, Market Making
Mark joined Arden in May 2017 to refocus and develop Arden’s Market Making and Trading desk using over 25 years trading experience across a full range of Equity markets. Previously, he spent five years at RBC helping to build the Equity business and prior to that was an MD at Citi, holding senior positions on the trading desk. Mark has also held trading desk positions at HSBC and Natwest markets and has a wide experience of trading both small and large cap stocks across UK and European markets.

Emilie Raker
Corporate Finance Assistant
With a keen interest in English Literature and Performing Arts, Emilie completed her A-Levels in 2015. Having previously worked in the property sector as a lettings negotiator, Emilie joined Arden in December 2018.

James Reed-Daunter
Executive Director
James is a Business Economics and Accountancy graduate of Southampton University. He joined Albert E Sharp in 1992 in their private clients unit working on the unit trust and fund management desk. In 1995 he moved to become an equity sales director selling small-mid cap stocks to UK investing institutions.
James is a founding partner of Arden from inception, joining in 2002 as Head of Equity sales, and served as CEO from 2012 to 2017. He is now Head of ECM, managing and developing key client relationships.

Charlotte Ridler
Investor Relations Manager
Charlotte joined Arden in 2016 following seven years at CLSA where she focussed on the organisation and management of deal /non-deal roadshows and conferences across the UK and Europe for Asia-Pacific listed companies, ranging in size from small to mega cap.

Paul Shackleton
Joint Head of Corporate Finance
Paul joined the UK Small Cap team at UBS Limited in the mid 1990s, covering M&A and Equity Capital Markets across all sectors including resources companies. He is an experienced Nominated Adviser and joined Arden Partners in 2017.

Akhil Shah
Corporate Finance Executive
Akhil joined Arden in November 2020 from St. James’s Place Wealth Management. During his time at SJP, he focused on executing transactions in capital markets and helped look after the Group’s external funding. In addition, he worked directly with a number of small and medium sized businesses to enact their strategic plans, both financially and operationally.

David-James Sheehan
Director, Wealth Management
David has over 20 years’ experience of trading equities and their derivative products. Most recently he ran the Family Office desk at Novum Securities, managing portfolios for several UHNW families.
Prior to that he managed the UK Client Department for a Private Bank in Luxembourg, with AUA of in excess of €2bn and before that he oversaw a sales/investment team at Townsley & Co (Insinger) stockbrokers.
In addition to managing both equity and derivative portfolios, he has specialist knowledge of fundraisings at primary and secondary levels.

Andrew Simms
Head of Equity Research
Andrew joined Arden in 2018 having spent 10 years covering Media, Utilities and Industrials at Citi, and most recently in Investor Relations at Experian. He is a Chartered Accountant and holds a MEng in Computer Science from the University of Bristol.

Daniel Slater
Research Director
Dan has over 10 years of City experience specialising in Oil & Gas. He began his career working in M&A at Rothschild, before moving to Arden in 2010 as Oil & Gas analyst. Dan is responsible for Arden’s Oil & Gas research product and is a CFA charterholder.

Nick Walker
Research Director – Renewable Energy, Cleantech & Sustainability
Nick has more than 16 years’ experience working in the City, leading teams in Renewable Energy, Clean Technology, Agriculture, Water Technology and Sustainable Materials. Nick began his career at Standard Chartered Securities in Hong Kong and subsequently worked at Beeson Gregory, Evolution Securities, Libertas Capital and Liberum Capital in London.

Elvia Wallace
Operations Director
Having previously worked in the Housing and Recruitment sectors, Elvia has worked within Financial Services for over 25 years, joining Arden Partners in 2003.

Alison Watson
Research Director
Alison joined Arden in 2020 and has 13 years’ experience as an equity research analyst. She began her career at UBS before leading the Real Estate Equity Research teams at Liberum and Investec. More recently she worked for an Investor Relations Advisory practice. Alison has a BSc in Physics from the University of Exeter.

Nick Wright
Corporate Finance Executive
Nick joined Arden in November 2020. Previously he worked at Deloitte in their Transaction Services and Audit teams, where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant.

Sebastian Wykeham
Equity Sales Director
Sebastian has over 25 years experience working in UK small and mid cap equities, initially as a fund manager with Singer & Friedlander, before moving into equity sales. He has worked for a number of successful institutional brokers, most recently Cenkos Securities. Sebastian has also spent time working for a number of successful US technology companies.