Giovanna is a Partner and Head of DACH at Altor Equity Partners. She focuses on mid-market investments in the Industrial and Business Services segments in the DACH region. Prior to joining Altor in 2018, she spent nearly 10 years at 3i in Germany. Giovanna started her career in M&A at Morgan Stanley and strategy consulting at McKinsey & Company in Frankfurt and London. Among her investments for Altor are Kaefer (family owned global insulation services business) and VTU (life science engineering business). Giovanna is engaged with Level20 (promotion of female investors in PE) and Invest Europe (Member of Mid Market Council).  

Massimo is the former Advisory and Deals leader of PwC Italy. 

In his 9 years tenure he built up a practice going from less than 45 million to a Deal Group exceeding 150m encompassing all Deal continuum from origination, value creation design and execution, all diligences and valuation analysis. He started a Debt Advisory offering, he supported the set up of a Family Office offering and reinforced Restructuring with a Turnaround practice.

In the last year in his role of Strategy and Deals Advisor  he is counseling some accounting firms in developing their Advisory platform, 

He is actively involved in potential equity investments in a number of difference sectors in coordination with selected legal firms with and without Private Equity involvements.  

In over 20 years of Deals practice he has been involved in numerous Italian and cross border transactions in a variety of industrial sectors after gaining international experience through a secondment in the Minneapolis and San Jose PwC offices. He set up numerous and effective International Desks that supported Corporate and Financial Investors in their international expansion. 

Main areas of expertise

• His professional experience range from financial advisor, Financial due diligence , arbitration roles, supporting the definition of trading contracts and negotiating support in both deals and restructuring procedures.

Industries

• Retail and consumer goods, hospitality, fashion, publishing, info-comm, telecom, automotive, chemical and biotech. 

His key clients include Italian blue chips like Pirelli, Versace, Prysmian, Telecom Italia, Luxottica, RCS Group, De Agostini, Barilla, Coesia, Crif and Mirato. He also supported a number of investors in the Italian market, including Swisscom, Areva, Elior, Assa Abloy, Alcatel Alenia, TDF, Reed Elsevier, Wolters Kluwer, Bureau Veritas, and the Chinese companies who had investment or further business development in Europe/Italy, such as ZTE, KEDA Clean Energy, Kerry Logistics, Haier, Suning, Tongrentang and CHP Management. 

Some of his largest projects included the restructuring of the combined group in connection with the acquisition of Auchan Italy operations by Conad, the acquisition of Pirelli by ChemChina, the acquisition of Candy by Haier, the acquisition of Saga Italia by Kerry Logistics, the acquisition of Welko by Keda, the acquisition of Fashionbox for the denim brand Replay by CHP Management, the disposal of the cable business of Pirelli, the acquisition of AOL Germany by Telecom Italia, the support to Swisscom in the acquisition of Fastweb, the disposal of Kamps Gmbh and Lieken AG by Barilla, the disposal of   EON’s Italian assets. 

Massimo is a certified chartered accountant (Dottore Commercialista) and a certified auditor (Revisore Contabile) in Italy. 

He developed in the past years an effective approach and coordination to support the Far East investors who interested in the Italian market. 

Michelle is the Finance Director for Corporate Development & Strategy at BAE Systems, a global company that provides some of the world's most advanced, technology-led defence, aerospace and security solutions. She has created a central team at BAE Systems focused on inorganic growth strategy, execution and integration.  A member of BAE Systems’ Strategy Council, Finance Council and Chief Technology and Investment Office, Michelle is also a member of the GCV Global Defence Council for defence venture investing and the UK Defence Investor Network.  She is also a Trustee of BAE Systems' Executive Pension Scheme.

Prior to joining BAE Systems, Michelle led Corporate Development for Parker's Europe, Middle East and African operations.  She was also a Director at DC Advisory, providing corporate finance advisory and started her career qualifying as a Certified Public Accountant at Ernst and Young.

Nicola leads the UK Deal Advisory business and is a Consumer Deals Partner with over 20 years of professional experience, almost exclusively in advising a range of corporate and private equity clients on M&A transactions.

Group CFO with 25 y. background in corporate finance in international, listed groups in the consumer/luxury sector. Currently Group CFO at SMCP (premium apparel brands, listed on Euronext Paris) since 2021, after 16 years at LVMH (12 years in several corporate positions at LVMH Group level - including financing; strategic controlling - and 4 years as brand CFO of Givenchy) and 5 years of external audit at Ernst & Young (banking sector). 

Independent Board member and Chair of the Audit Committee of The Edrington Group (ultra-premium spirits, incl. The Macallan) in Scotland.

Rachel is Mergermarket’s Head of Auctions and co-Head of News, overseeing the publication's private markets and M&A coverage in Europe

With over three decades of distinguished service at Shell, Roland has built an illustrious career spanning roles across finance, acquisitions, divestments and business development in the global energy sector. Currently serving as the Senior Vice President of Acquisitions, Divestments & New Business Development for Downstream and Renewables in London, Roland leverages deep expertise to drive transformative growth and sustainable change. Prior to this, he served as the Senior Vice President of Finance for Global Mobility where he led strategic financial initiatives that enabled operational excellence worldwide.

Throughout his tenure, Roland has held key leadership positions including Vice President Finance for Global Marketing, Head of M&A Finance for Global Downstream, and General Manager Finance for EMEA Lubricants. Notably, he contributed to upstream operations as M&A Finance Manager for Nigeria, overseeing complex financial strategies to optimise value. Earlier in his career, he held various finance roles in Africa including Finance Manager for Cote d'Ivoire and Gabon Downstream, reflecting his deep international expertise and adaptability.

Professor Scott Moeller has been teaching at Bayes Business School since 2002. He is the founder and Director of the M&A Research Centre (https://www.bayes.city.ac.uk/faculties-and-research/centres/marc) and the former CEO and Director of Executive Education. Amongst other finance-related modules, he teaches the 'Mergers & Acquisitions' elective in the MBA and 'Corporate Finance' in the executive education programmes. He has also been a visiting lecturer at Imperial College (London) and Oxford University.

Scott is a frequent commentator on business issues related to M&A on television (BBC, CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC) and in the press (Financial Times, Sunday Times, Independent) and has written for the Wall Street Journal, the BBC and other publications. One of seven books received an award in the United States as one of the top 30 business books of the year in 2008 ('Intelligent M&A: Navigating the Mergers and Acquisitions Minefield' now in a second edition published in 2014) . His most recent book (co-authored) is 'The Deal Paradox: Mergers and Acquisitions Success in the Age of Digital Transformation', published in 2023.

Scott had a long career in banking prior to his move to academia. During his six years at Deutsche Bank, Scott was Global Head of the bank’s corporate venture capital unit, Managing Director of the Investment Bank's Global eBusiness Division and Managing Director of the department responsible for world-wide strategy and new business acquisitions. Scott worked first at Booz Allen & Hamilton Management Consultants for over 5 years and then at Morgan Stanley for over 12 years in New York, Japan, and then as co-manager and then member of the board of Morgan Stanley Bank AG in Germany. Scott has held a number of other board seats throughout Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas and is currently a non-executive director on several boards.