Our Team
ManoCap is managed by Tom Cairnes and Niall O'Cathasaigh.
Tom Cairnes - Manager, ManoCap
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Niall O'Cathasaigh - Manager, ManoCap
Read More on Niall
Our Advisory Board
In addition to this core team, SIF has strong local and international advisors.
Our Board of Advisors, chaired by Lord Stevenson of Coddenham, brings significant experience from international business and fund management.
The members of the advisory board are:
Lord Stevenson - Chairman of HBOS
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John Burgess - Partner, B C Capital
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Peter Davies - Partner, Lansdowne Partners
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Lisa Curtis - Private Sector Advisor, DfID
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Andrew Dechet - Partner, Texas Pacific Group
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Dominic Shorthouse - Partner, Englefield Capital
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Herman Spruit - Chairman, Marakon Associates
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Graham Wrigley - Partner, Permira
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Tom Cairnes
Tom has been living and working in Sierra Leone since 2004, firstly as the private sector consultant for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and since November 2005 in the development of ManoCap.
He has worked for Lansdowne Partners, a UK based hedge fund manager focussing on UK equities and as a management consultant for Marakon Associates in London, New York, Amsterdam and Mexico, focused primarily of the financial services sector.
He has an M.Phil in Development Studies from Cambridge University, and a BA in Human Sciences from Oxford University.
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Niall O'Cathasaigh
Niall is a qualified management accountant (CIMA) with a strong industry background.
He has lived in Sierra Leone since 2004, initially working as the Financial Controller for GOAL Sierra Leone, and since November 2005 on the development of ManoCap.
He has previously worked as an Accounting and Finance manager for Apple Computer at their European Headquarters and as Accounting Manager for the French subsidiary companies of Avery Dennison.
Niall successfully established and exited his own business in Ireland before training to become an accountant.
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Lord Stevenson of Coddenham CBE
Dennis Stevenson's main business activity is as Chairman of HBOS plc (merged Halifax plc and Bank of Scotland plc).
Until recently he was also Chairman of Pearson plc. He is also a non executive director of Manpower Inc and Honorary President of St James's Place Capital plc.
He is Chairman of the House of Lords Appointments Commission responsible for vetting all members of the reformed House of Lords and choosing the independent members and has also been installed as the first Chancellor of University of the Arts London.
He retired in 1998 after 10 years as Chairman of the Trustees of the Tate Gallery.
He is a Trustee of the Tate Gallery Foundation and Chairman of Aldeburgh Productions.
Having headed the Stevenson Commission set up by The Rt Hon Tony Blair to examine the role of Information Technology in Schools he acted as the Prime Minister's Special Adviser on the application of ICT to education until September 2000.
Earlier in his career he founded and built a group of businesses; while he retains shareholdings in some of these he has no active management role.
He is a past chairman of Aycliffe and Peterlee New Town Development Corporation, the National Association of Youth Clubs and the Intermediate Technology Development Group.
He sits on the cross-benches at the House of Lords.
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John Burgess
John Burgess was a co-founder and Managing Partner of BC Partners until he retired from the firm in June 2005.
Since its inception in 1986, BC Partners has grown to become one of Europe's leading private equity firms with 35 investment professionals located in London, Paris, Milan, Hamburg, Geneva and New York.
The firm has invested through acquisition in over 50 businesses with an aggregate value of over €30bn, many of which have successfully developed to become public companies.
BC Partners is currently investing in its eighth fund, which has capital commitments of nearly €6bn, and focuses on large European-based businesses with strong competitive positions.
Prior to founding BC Partners, John developed his private equity experience with Candover Investments and F&C Ventures, following over eight years with The Boston Consulting Group in Paris.
He has an MBA from INSEAD and an engineering degree from Cambridge.
He speaks English and French.
John is currently the Chairman of Amadeus IT Group SA, a global flight reservation and airline IT service business, and of Baxi Holdings Ltd, a major European supplier of residential heating products.
He is also a Director of C&C Group plc, a listed Irish company best known for its Bulmers and Magners brands of cider.
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Peter Davies
Peter Davies is a Limited Partner of Lansdowne Partners Limited Partnership, an investment firm specialising in research-based Absolute Return products, and he is also the Joint Manager of the Lansdowne UK Equity Fund.
Prior to this he ran unit trusts and pension fund assets at Merrill Lynch Investment Management (previous Mercury Asset Management).
He was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained a first class honours degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics.
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Lisa Curtis
Lisa Curtis is DFID's Private Sector Adviser in Sierra Leone.
Since mid 2004 she has been leading an innovative programme mobilizing the private sector and particularly the diaspora to contribute to Sierra Leone's economic recovery and its Poverty Reduction Strategy programme.
Prior to this, Lisa has 19 years experience of strategy consulting for a wide range of public and private sector clients.
She combines financial, microeconomics and organization restructuring skills.
She has advised on business restructuring, corporate strategy, institutional reform, corporate governance, mergers & acquisitions and numerous privatizations.
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Andrew Dechet
Andrew Dechet is a Partner of Texas Pacific Group in London.
Most recently, he led TPG's investment in mobilcom, the listed German mobile reseller, and Eutelsat, the French satellite provider which was taken public on Euronext at an enterprise value of just over €5 billion in December 2005.
He has responsibility for TPG's efforts in the Industrials, Power and Utilities sectors, and has also led investments in the Business Services and Telecommunications sectors.
Before joining TPG in 1998, Mr. Dechet worked in the Corporate Finance Department of Goldman Sachs & Company in New York.
He graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University and was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University.
Mr. Dechet serves on the Boards of Directors of several companies in the TPG portfolio, including Eutelsat and mobilcom AG.
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Dominic Shorthouse
Dominic Shorthouseis the founder and managing partner of Englefield Capital, a mid-market private equity business based in London.
Prior to founding Englefield in 2002, Dominic was one of a team of three which in 1988 opened a London office for the US private equity firm Warburg Pincus.
During his time at Warburg Pincus, Dominic was part of a small group which invested more than $2 billion in more than 50 private equity transactions in 12 different European countries.
Dominic graduated from Oxford University with an MA in Latin and Greek literature and philosophy and has an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.
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Herman Spruit
Herman Spruit is Chairman of Marakon Associates' UK and European business.
He works closely with senior, international business leaders across a wide range of industries.
He helps leaders conceive and deliver long-term growth by reviewing fundamental strategy and organisational choices, whilst at the same time helping them deal with personal and professional challenges in their own leadership roles.
He joined Marakon in 1989 and helped to establish the firm's European practice.
He was elected to partner in 1994 and managed the London office from 1996-98.
Before joining Marakon, he gained much international business experience and a strong commercial background from working at HSBC in the Middle East, Asia and the South Pacific in a broad set of general management roles.
He worked at HSBC from 1981 to 1988.
Outside the corporate sector Herman advises the Head of The Geoffrey Chaucer Technology College in Southwark, London and since September 2003 has maintained both a personal and commercial relationship with Ellen MacArthur's sports management and marketing business, Offshore Challenge Group.
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Graham Wrigley
Graham Wrigley has had a 17 year career in private equity at Permira.
He has been a member of the firm's management board as it has grown into one of the leading private equity firms in the world.
Focusing on the TMT sector he has been directly involved in over 20 transactions and served on the board of many of these investments, either as director or chairman.
Prior to Permira and an MBA at INSEAD he worked at Bain&Co.
He studied law at Cambridge University, and has spent 2½ years travelling the world in various gap years.
In 2007 he is intending to start a new phase in his career, involving a long held interest in third world economic development.
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