Private equity investment platform Seedrs, has appointed Ian McCaig and Mark Brooker as non-executive directors. The appointments follow three C-suite level hires at Seedrs in the last 18 months as the company continues to grow rapidly.
This announcement comes shortly after Seedrs released its 2017 accounts, recording 87 per cent growth in revenue from 2016 to 2017. The company’s turnover rose to GBP2.02 million in 2017 up from GBP1.08 million in 2016, attributed to a 43 per cent increase in investment on the platform and a 59 per cent increase in the average size of campaigns.
McCaig is the former Chief Executive Officer of First Utility, the UK’s largest independent energy provider. Prior to that, he was Chief Executive Officer of lastminute.com, the pioneering online travel and leisure business. A seasoned business leader, McCaig began his career in IT before joining Nokia in 1997, where he was responsible for bringing some of the world’s first 3G networks to markets across Europe and Asia.
In 2003, McCaig joined lastminute.com and helped the business through its GBP577 million sale to Sabre Holdings, the major US-based travel technology company. He went on to become group CEO in 2006, steering the business through five successful years. McCaig’s most recent executive role was CEO at First Utility, where he grew the business to nearly 1 million customers and GBP1 billion revenue over six years. First Utility was sold to energy giant Shell in late 2017.
McCaig, Non-Executive Director at Seedrs, says: “Seedrs is leading the transformation of a whole business ecosystem. It’s extremely exciting to be joining the Board and working with this super-talented team.”
Brooker’s career began with 17 years in investment banking at Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch, gaining extensive experience raising equity capital and leading mergers and acquisitions for public companies. During this time, Brooker helped clients raise over GBP25 billion of equity capital from public market investors, including 12 IPOs.
Following this, Brooker went on to join Betfair, one of the world’s leading online betting companies. He stayed there for 6 years in several roles, including COO, and among other things he led the development of Betfair’s sportsbook. Brooker subsequently moved to Trainline and took on the COO role with responsibility for the commercial, marketing and product development teams.
Mark Brooker, Non-Executive Director Designate at Seedrs, says: “I’m delighted to be joining the board of Seedrs and look forward to helping the team grow the platform and enable many more entrepreneurial companies to efficiently raise capital.”
Jeff Lynn, Executive Chairman and Co-Founder at Seedrs, says: “I’m delighted to welcome Ian and Mark to Seedrs. They bring with them a wealth of experience and knowledge around growing fast-moving technology businesses in the European market and beyond. They both have a proven track record as trusted leaders, and their experience at some of Europe’s digital giants will be invaluable to us as we continue to scale.”
