Conference Fund Managers

Rikki Bannan is an Executive Director at IFM Investors, a global fund manager with over $215bn of funds under management. As a Portfolio Manager in IFM Investors’ Small Caps fund, Rikki is responsible for investment decisions across the consumer discretionary, health care and technology sectors, as well as being actively involved in fund raising and investor engagement for the Small Cap product.

Rikki also sits on the Advisory Committee of HEAL Partners, a growth Private Equity fund focused on investments within the Health, Education and Lifestyle sectors.
Prior to joining IFM Investors in 2015, Rikki spent six years as a Senior Equities Analyst at Macquarie Bank. Over this time she held roles in the Equity Strategy team and as an Industrials Analyst.

Rikki is a Chartered Accountant and commenced her career in KPMG’s Audit & Assurance division. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Finance & Accounting) from The University
of Sydney.

Jeremy founded Terra Capital In 2010 launching the long only Terra Capital Global Natural Resources Fund. The fund has delivered strong performance resulting in Terra Capital becoming one of Australia’s longest running open ended global resources fund. Jeremy formally worked at RAB Capital’s Special Situations Fund, a US $2.5B long/short strategy focused on mining and energy. The fund was rated the “Best Energy and Natural Resource Fund” by Hedge Fund Review and ranked No.1 in Barron’s Hedge Fund 50 Global rankings in 2007, during Jeremy’s tenure. Prior to RAB Jeremy worked at Western Australian corporate advisory firm Azure Capital.

Sumit Gautam started Scalar Gauge in 2017 and has been the Portfolio Manager for the fund for over 7 years.

Prior to Scalar, he was a Partner at Hirzel Capital, ~$1.3B AUM long/short equity hedge fund based in Dallas, where he focused on investments in the technology sector for 4 years. He also has significant private equity investing experience, having worked as a Vice President at Audax Private Equity Fund, which is a $20B+ AUM PE fund based in Boston. Prior to Audax, he was a Senior Manager / Principal at Bain & Company’s private equity group. In his 4 years at Bain, he worked with some of the largest PE funds in primary due diligence for LBO targets.

One of Sumit’s differentiation is direct operational experience in technology companies – having worked at a VC funded tech startup in Silicon Valley which later got acquired by Dell for ~$700MM. Sumit started his career as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company in Silicon Valley. Sumit is a CFA charterholder, has a B.Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology, and an MS from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Jordan is a Partner and Senior Investment Team Member of Advent Global Opportunities. Jordan joined AGO in 2015 at the inception of the fund and oversees AGO’s investments in a number of key sectors including aerospace and fintech.

Prior to Advent Global Opportunities, Jordan was a member of the investment team of Belfer Management, a single-family office based out of New York. From 2011-2013, Jordan was an Associate at Crestview Partners, a middle-market private equity firm.

He began his career in the investment banking division of JPMorgan. Jordan graduated from Princeton University where he was a member of the men’s rowing team.

Beeneet Kothari is the Managing Partner and Principal Portfolio Manager of Tekne Capital Management, a global fund manager he founded in 2012. Prior, he was a Managing Director at PointState Capital and Duquesne Capital, a global macro hedge fund founded by Stan Druckenmiller.

Tekne Capital Management is a global Technology investment manager based in New York with a footprint across several global Emerging Markets. Tekne manages over USD$1 billion, and their investment focus is exclusively on tech-related businesses with a heavy tilt towards non-US/emerging markets in a concentrated portfolio with multi-year holding periods.

Their flagship fund remains highly focused on owning a concentrated and diversified group of the leading non-US technology companies globally, where growth remains robust while public market valuations remain depressed.

Responsible for leading Ellerston’s investment team, Chris has served as a Director and Portfolio Manager of Ellerston since 2005 and has over 39 years investment experience. Prior to joining Ellerston, Chris co-founded the Melbourne based Investment Management firm Portfolio Partners in 1994, where he held various positions including Director and Senior Investment Manager and was formerly the Head of Equities until January 2003. It was from that point that he gave up his role to conceive and focus on managing the highly successful Elite Opportunities Concentrated Australian Shares Fund.

Prior to Portfolio Partners, Chris worked as a Senior Portfolio Manager, Deputy Head of Equities and Head of Resources Strategy at County Natwest Australia Investment Management where he was responsible for the management of County’s largest specialist equity mandates.

Chris has a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Melbourne and is a Senior Associate of the Financial Services Institute of Australia. Chris was inducted into the Australian Fund Managers Foundation Hall of Fame in 2018 in recognition of his contribution to the industry.

Samir has over 34 years’ industry experience and joined JOHCM in May 2011.

Prior to joining JOHCM, he was a Partner and Chief Investment Officer (CIO) at a firm specialising in Asian equities – Silver Metis Capital Management Pte Ltd. Samir was previously at Lloyd George Management where he worked as CIO. Prior to joining LGM, he worked at Peregrine Securities and ANZ Grindlays Bank for close to eight years as an Analyst specialising in India.

Samir is a CFA Charterholder and holds a BCom from Bombay University.

With 25 years’ experience in disruptive business models gained during a career with Macquarie Bank, Alex heads one of the best-performing teams in global investment management in Australia.

He has a deep understanding of the mechanisms through which disruption changes business models and the impact it has on company valuation, having identified and invested in
AI in 2016 through Nvidia, among many other companies which have generated strong portfolio returns over the ten years the fund has operated.

Vihari Ross has over two decades of experience in investment management working across large institutions and boutique investment managers. She is currently a Portfolio Manager with global coverage at Antipodes Partners, a specialist equities firm managing over $10 billion on behalf of Australian and international investors.

Prior to joining Antipodes, Vihari was a senior investment team member at Magellan Financial Group where she spent over 15 years. She was head of research, responsible for the management of the 30-person global research team prior to her departure, and during this time, she designed the Magellan Core Global strategy and was the Fund’s portfolio manager. Earlier in her career at Magellan, Vihari was sector head of franchises (consumer) and covered the financial and consumer sectors as an investment analyst.

From 2003-2007 Vihari was at Ausbil Dexia, responsible for coverage of the financial and consumer sectors as well as quantitative analysis. She commenced her investing career at Commonwealth Investment Management in a strategy and research role. Vihari holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Actuarial Studies and Finance) and a Master of Commerce (Finance) from the University of New South Wales and is an Associate of the Institute of Actuaries.

Ricky founded Eminence Capital in 1999. Today, Eminence is a ~$7.8B global investment management organisation investing client capital across global financial markets. As CEO and CIO of Eminence, Ricky is responsible for setting the firm’s strategic direction as well as directly managing its 20+ person investment team and diversified investment portfolio.

Prior to launching Eminence, Ricky was Co-Founder and Co-General Partner of Fusion Capital Management, a firm that managed a global long/short equity fund. Prior to that he was a research analyst at Mark Asset Management, where he began his investing career in 1991.

Ricky received a BBA in Accounting and Finance graduating with honors from the University of Wisconsin. Ricky developed and teaches a capstone Finance course at Wisconsin, Applied Equity Markets Research, and launched Badgers in Finance, a professional and recruitment network for UW students and alumni across financial services. Ricky serves as an advisor on the Investment Committee for the University of Wisconsin Foundation and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Fleur has over 25 years investment experience and is Portfolio Manager and Analyst for the Global Equity strategy. Fleur joined Northcape
in 2018.

Before joining Northcape, Fleur was a Managing Director at UBS in Sydney. Having joined UBS in London in 2004 as a European Special Situations Analyst she progressed to Pan European Equity Sales and Account Manager for a range of fundamental hedge funds and long only institutions before returning to Australia with UBS in 2011. Initially Fleur established the business of European and US Equity Sales to investors based in Asia, then took over Global Sales to Australian based investors before eventually running the wider APAC Global Equity sales team.

Before moving to the UK Fleur spent five years as a Generalist Equity Research Analyst at Capital Partners (now CP2), a boutique independent research advisory firm with expertise in the infrastructure sector.
Fleur holds a Bachelor of Commerce (First Class Honours in Finance) from the University of Sydney and is a CFA® Charterholder. In 2017 she completed not-for-profit directorship training with the Australian Institute of Company Directors under The Observership Program®.