Nordic M&A and Private Equity Forum

Cecilia Malmström European Union Commissioner for Trade (2014-2019)

Cecilia Malmström (born 1968) is a Swedish citizen, married with two children. 

She partly grew up in France. She has studied French literature at Sorbonne Universiti, Paris, political science, development studies and international relations at Göteborg University in Sweden. She presented her Ph.D. thesis in Political Science at Göteborg University in April 1998. The subject of the thesis was regionalist parties in Europe, focusing on Spain and Italy. (Makten, regionen och härligheten. Regionala partier i Europa. SNS Förlag 1998) In parallel with the studies, she has also lectured and done research at the same institution. The topics have covered different aspects of European politics, migration, terrorism etc.  

Apart from the academic work she has also worked as a technical assistant at SKF in Paris, Stuttgart and Barcelona, as an assistant psychiatric nurse at Lillhagens mentalsjukhus and as a teacher in social sciences at Lindholmen Komvux.  

Her political career started in Göteborg as a member of the Liberal party. She was the vice chair of the municipal immigration committee and was later elected as a member of the Regional Assembly of Västra Götaland. Member of the liberal party executive committee for many years and vice chair of the party 2007-2010. She was elected to the European Parliament in 1999, reelected in 2004 but left in 2006 to serve as Minister of European Affairs in the Swedish government. In 2010, she was appointed Commissioner for Home affairs in the European Commission, Brussels and served as European Union Commissioner for Trade 2014-2019. 

Since January 2020 she is Assar Gabrielsson visiting professor at Göteborg School of Economics at Göteborg University, Sweden. Cecilia Malmström speaks Swedish, English, French and Spanish and has a fair understanding of German and Italian. She has published books and academic articles on European Politics, Spanish and Italian politics, Migration issues etc.

Michel Annink Regional Director Hampleton Partners

Michel Annink is Regional Director Nordics at Hampleton Partners, a leading European-based advisory firm specialized in Merger &  Acquisition and corporate finance advisory services to owners of technology  companies. Educated at Utrecht, Stanford and Harvard University, Michel is  passionate about technology disruptions and their potential to transform  businesses and society.

Prior to joining the Hampleton team in 2018, Michel held  multiple senior executive leadership positions at Microsoft Corporation, Salesforce and NEVS.

Daniel Berglund Partner Nordic Capital

Joined in January 2010. Daniel currently serves on the boards of five of Nordic Capital’s portfolio companies and has previously been a board member of a further six companies. Daniel focuses on investment situations within Technology and Payments as well has Healthcare IT. Before joining Nordic Capital he worked at Bain & CO (2007–2009), most recently as Senior Associate. Daniel holds an MSc in Economics and Business Administration from the Stockholm School of Economics and the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan.

Torborg Chetkovich Partner CapMan Infra

Mrs Torborg Chetkovich, BSc Business Administration and Economics at Uppsala University and MBA at IMD Lausanne, has over 25 years of experience from leading positions within the transport, real estate and infrastructure sector.

During the years her main focus has been to successfully increase profitability and create share-holder value through in-depth turn-arounds in complex environments involving many stake holders, always with the customer needs in focus for the company and employees to act upon.

She began her career at Swedish State Railways between 1991 – 1999, before moving on to Veolia Transport, at the time Sweden´s largest passenger transportation company, as Transport Director. During 2006 - 2008 she served as Deputy CEO at Veolia Transport Sweden. 2008 she took the position as CEO for MTR Nordic and won their first contract in the region being the tender of the metro operations in Stockholm (contract worth 30 billion SEK). In only 9 months she built up the new company and delivered a successful takeover of the metro operations. Between 2010 - 2015 Mrs. Chetkovich served as Group CEO at Swedavia, a company established 2010 operating ten climate neutral airports across Sweden, still focusing on customer and employee satisfaction, profitability and sustainability in order to secure competitive strength over time.

Mrs Chetkovich has served at several boards over time including Stockmann Plc, ACI (Airports Council International) Europe, Almega, MTR Nordic, Veolia Transport Sweden being some of the examples. She has also served as Industrial Advisor for EQT Partners / EQT AB but also as Independent Advisor to owners, boards and management teams.

Currently she is a Partner at CapMan Infra, part of the CapMan Group. She holds the position as Chairman of the Board of Directors at Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce in Sweden , Acting Chairperson at Norled AS and Board member of Center for Higher Ambition Leadership Europe.

Mrs Chetkovich has successfully developed large organizations over more than 25 years and have a strong interest in leadership and is also acting as a mentor since several years in official mentor programs.

Konrad Deiters Partner Mercer

Konrad is a Partner and leads Mercer’s International M&A business. He has a wealth of experience in international HR management and M&A gained from both line management and consulting roles.

He has worked for 16 years in the area of HR consulting incl. HR M&A in an international context. He supports clients in all aspects that matter from the Workforce and HR perspective and has worked on a large number of projects across the Globe. During the last 12 years he has been involved in multiple transactions by supporting the organizational and HR due diligence through post-merger integration. Within this context he has been involved in various restructuring projects. Konrad has worked on numerous projects developing and executing organization strategy. Furthermore he works closely with senior executives of corporates and private equity firms on a variety of Leadership, People and HR issues. He has particular expertise in: Mergers & Acquisitions, human capital strategy, synergy realization, rewards, labor relations, leadership assessment and development , HR transformation, culture alignment, transformation and change management. Prior to joining Mercer he held positions as leader of PWC’s HR Management and M&A business and was Mercer’s HR M&A Consulting Head for Central Europe and Italy.

Konrad studied political economy at Ludwig Maximilian’s University in Munich and at the insurance academy in Munich, Germany, where he graduated as an insurance economist. During 2002/2003 he graduated from an Executive Education Program at Babson College, Boston and he has completed the M&A Executive Program at the Wharton School. Konrad is fluent in German, English and Italian.

Nikolai Djupesland Partner, Managing Director, M&A RiskPoint

Nikolai is the Managing Director for RiskPoint M&A globally. He joined RiskPoint in 2013, initially working with D&O and Securities Offering Liability Insurance before joining the M&A team. Nikolai holds an LL.M from the University of Oslo and a BSc in Business and Economics from BI Norwegian Business School. Previously, Nikolai was Head of M&A, Nordics.

Christian Doglia Founding Partner Infranode

Christian is a Founding Partner of Infranode. He has over 15 years of infrastructure sector experience and a total of 18 years international experience in credit structuring, corporate finance and business development across a variety of European jurisdictions. 

Christian co-leads Infranode’s activity, chairs its Board of Directors and is a member of its Investment Committee. Prior to launching Infranode, Christian was a Senior Advisor to SEK (Svenskt Export Kredit) Advisory Services, evaluating the setup of an export dedicated infrastructure fund, the Swedish Export and Infrastructure Fund and Head of Corporate Development and Legal at IBS, the Swedish international software company.

He graduated from the Universitá Bocconi in Milan with a degree in Financial Markets and Institutions. He later studied at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam and the London Business School. He is a native Italian speaker, he is fluent in English and Slovene and has a good knowledge of Swedish and French.

Christian Fenner Partner DLA Piper

Partner Christian P. N. Fenner's principal area of expertise is M&A, focusing on the private equity and venture capital communities. He has considerable experience in leading complex cross-border transactions, frequently representing both global and national buy-out funds and industrial clients.

Christian has more than 12 years of experience as a corporate lawyer. He is well-known for his dedication and commercial approach to any process he is involved in.

Catherine Ford Consultant Editor

Catherine Ford is a consultant editor to event programmes, and engaged in the development of timely editorial content for global corporate finance, M&A and capital markets related conferences and events. She routinely moderates discussion panels at conferences across the region. She has worked for Acuris since early 2002, holding a number of senior editorial roles in the company’s European, US and Asia-Pacific head offices.

Thomas Fossum Deals Practice Leader, Sweden PwC

Thomas is a member of PwC Sweden's leadership team, responsible for Deals Services, the largest provider of transaction services, M&A, valuation & financial modelling, carveouts & merger integrations, deal strategy, restructuring, and M&A Tax and Legal, in the Nordics.

Having planned and executed post merger integrations and carve-outs for almost 20 years, Thomas has extensive experience from M&A driven transformations, often with significant growth ambitions, structural changes and cost synergies capturing.

Most of Thomas’ client engagements are in a multi-functional and multi-national setting, making the ability to prioritise and coordinate across often conflicting needs, national legislation and cultural differences an imperative. Recurring clients include large Nordic corporates and Private Equity companies.

Thomas holds a Diplom-Kaufmann degree from the University of Mannheim, Germany. A native Norwegian, he speaks English, German, and Scandinavian.

Clementine Fox Head of Account Management Luminance

Clementine is Head of Account Management at Luminance, the artificial intelligence platform for the legal profession. She is responsible for managing and overseeing Luminance clients across the globe, as well as leading adoption and strategic planning for implementation of the platform. She was admitted as a solicitor (not currently practicing) in the Supreme Court of Queensland, Australia in 2016. Prior to joining Luminance, Clementine worked as an analyst at the Australian Department of Defence. She has also completed a secondment to the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Ragnar Hellenius Partner & Head of Nordic Region PAI Partners

Ragnar Hellenius is responsible  for the Nordic Team at PAI. He is the chairman for Atos Medical and is on the  board of ADB Safegate Group and Perstorp.

He has extensive experience in  management consulting having worked for Accenture, McKinsey & Company and  Booz Allen Hamilton. Prior to joining PAI, he worked as CFO and deputy CEO for Unibet Plc, a European on-line gaming company.

Erik Hjelmsted COO KRY

Erik Hjelmsted is COO and Managing Director for Swedish KRY. He has a long experience ofexecutive functions within media, retail with previous positions such as Headof Change Office at Schibsted Media Group, COO for Schibsted Sweden as well as member of the board for Schibsted Growth, Svenska Dagbladet, Aftonbladet and Hitta.se. Erik holds a Master of Science in Business Administration from Stockholm School of Economics. 

Peter Ihrfelt Partner DLA Piper

Peter Ihrfelt works mainly with M&A and private equity. Peter has extensive experience of both domestic and cross-border transactions and he has acted in relation to investments within a large number of sectors. He also regularly serves as legal and strategic advisor to entrepreneurial businesses.

Peter is also very experienced in advising on investments in wind power and other types of renewable energy sources.

Peter heads DLA Piper's Energy sector in Sweden.

Timo Leskinen Senior Vice President, Human Resources Konecranes

Education: M.Sc. (Psy)

Working experience:

Konecranes 2013 – present: Senior Vice President, Human Resources
Fiskars 2009 – 2013: Vice President, Human Resources
Nokia Services 2008 – 2009: Director HR
Nokia Customer and Market Operations 2006 – 2007: Director, HR
Nokia Ventures organization 2004 – 2006: Head of Operations
Nokia Ventures organization 2000-2004: HR Manager
MPS 1999 – 2000: HR Consultant

David L. Lillo SVP, Head of Business Development Nordics, Private Equity and M&A Marsh JLT Specialty

David is specialized in M&Ainsurance products and advises on and places both W&I- and contingent riskinsurance policies. He joined Marsh in 2014 and, in addition to placingtransactional risk insurance, has assumed theposition as Nordic Head of Business Development for the Private Equity andM&A practice. Prior to joining Marsh Davidworked as InvestmentAssociate for a leading Private Equity firm based in the Middle East. David hasalso worked as an M&A Associate withLinklaters.He holds an MBA from IE Business School and an LL.M. from Uppsala University.

Leif Lupp Managing Director, Nordics Aurelius Equities

Leif Lupp is  Managing Director Nordics at Aurelius Equities, where he heads the Nordics  investment office in Stockholm.  Aurelius is listed on the German stock  exchange and invests with a long-term  investment horizon in companies  with operational improvement potential. Leif  started his career at  Barclays Bank, where he advised large European corporate  clients on  Mergers & Acquisitions as well as Corporate Financing solutions.   Subsequently, Leif was the Head of Corporate Finance at the Danish  wind-turbine  maker Vestas Wind Systems, where he was part of the  management team that  secured Vestas‘  turnaround back in 2012/2013.  Prior to joining Aurelius, Leif was active as a  private equity investor  with IMCap Partners, an investment platform for small-  to medium-sized  companies, which he co-founded in Zürich, Switzerland.

Christoffer Malmer Head SEBx

Mr. Malmer joined SEB in 2011 as Head of Financial Institutions Coverage, before becoming a member of the Group Executive Committee as Head of the Wealth Management division in 2015. In 2016, he became Co-Head of the Corporate & Private Customers division within SEB.

In April 2018 Mr. Malmer was appointed Head of the SEBx-project, a strategic initiative to explore new technologies and new customer offerings.

Prior to joining SEB, Mr. Malmer spent nine years at Goldman Sachs in London where he in 2007 was made Managing Director and head of the European Equity Research Team, covering Financial Institutions. In 2009, he moved back to Sweden and spent two years advising Arrowgrass Capital Partners on investments in Financial Institutions. Christoffer Malmer earned a Bachelor of Arts in International Business Administration at the University of Lund in 2000.

Keith McCambridge Partner, Organisational Effectiveness Oliver Wyman

Keith is a Partner at Oliver Wyman, specialising in the development of leadership in organisations.

A leading coach and leadership advisor to boards and executive teams, Keith has worked across sectors, developing leadership solutions in Utilities, Financial Services, Retail, Information Technology, Infrastructure and Consumer Services. He has pursued his career globally, building interventions and initiatives for a range of cultures and environments, including Africa, Asia, North America and Europe. 

Keith joined Oliver Wyman in March 2018. Prior to this, he jointly owned and led the London office of a Leadership Consultancy business for 14 years. He was a Partner at Whitehead Mann previously, working in the Assessment & Development team, on projects such as the RBS – Nat West merger, Commercial Union – General Accident merger, BP executive leadership programme and other M&A activity. Keith’s early career was with the British Army. He resigned his commission as a Captain in the Royal Engineers in 1995, after serving on operations in Northern Ireland, the Falklands and Sarajevo. (Former Yugoslavia) 

Dermot McCloskey Head of Research Inframation Group

Dermot joined Inframation in 2013 and heads its research team. Based in London, he leads the company’s institutional and fundraising coverage, while overseeing a global team covering all aspects of infrastructure finance. He holds an LLB in Laws from the London School of Economics.

Rasmus Molander Partner Adelis Equity Partners

Rasmus  is a Partner at Adelis Equity Partners. Prior to joining Adelis, Rasmus worked  at Permira as a member of the Healthcare and Nordic teams and at the Boston  Consulting Group (BCG). Rasmus serves as the Chairman of the Board of Ropo  Capital and Dayton Group as well as a member of the Board of SSI Diagnostica,  Quattro Mikenti Group, Puuilo and Valtti. He has previously served as Chairman  of the Board of Med Group and a member of the Board / deal team of e.g. NGI and  Pharmaq.

Education: MBA,  Harvard Business School (Baker Scholar), Boston and MSc, Helsinki University of  Technology / Boston University

Andreas Ossmark Partner Scope

Andreas Ossmark is a Partner and co-founder of Scope. Scope invests in Nordic growth opportunities; partnering with organizations with a proven value added and a differentiated value proposition to create sustainable, growing companies. Mr. Ossmark has served in numerous boards over the years and is currently at the board of Klättermusen, Footbalance and Happy Plugs.

Ilkka Perheentupa Partner Avance

Ilkka represents fund and industrial clients in mergers and acquisitions, investment and capital markets transactions, as well as shareholder, contractual and corporate matters. He has spent a significant part of his career in a corporate, capital markets and private equity practice in New York and London. In addition to his practice under Finnish law, Ilkka regularly advises clients with respect to their investments in the United States and US law implications of their operations. Industries that Ilkka has recently served include private equity and venture capital, energy and infrastructure, gaming, media and entertainment, and technology. In addition to a Finnish law degree, Ilkka is also admitted to the New York State Bar.

Dorthe Rosenkilde Saunders Head of Corporate and M&A, Attorney-at-law Group Legal & Compliance Nets Group

Dorthe joined the Nets Group in 2014  and is heading up the Corporate and M&A team in Nets’ Group Legal &  Compliance Department. Dorthe has more than 13 years’ experience working in an  international M&A environment – both as an external legal advisor and as an  in-house specialist. Dorthe has extensive experience with acquisitions, divestments and cross-border mergers and demergers across Europe, especially  within the payments industry. 

Karl Sandström Head of Tax Insurance Nordics, Private Equity and M&A Marsh JLT Specialty

Karl joined Marsh JLT Specialty in 2020 and focuses on tax insurances. He has ca. 20 years of experience as a tax advisor and has focused on M&A related taxaspects throughout his career. Karl was previously partner and Head of M&A Tax at Deloitte for nine years, and before that he worked as a tax lawyer at the law firms Linklaters and Mannheimer Swartling. 

Šarūnas Stepukonis Partner BaltCap

Šarūnas Stepukonis has been with BaltCap, the largest private equity manager in the Baltic countries, since 2011. He is responsible for a EUR100 million BaltCap Infrastructure Fund, funded by institutional investors such as European Investment Bank, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, NEFCO and  local pension funds. He serves as Chairman of the Board at 48MW biomass plant in Vilnius, 4.9MW biogas portfolio in Latvia, 4MW_el and 18MW_th biomass CHP in Riga as well as 7,431m² greenfield  development of school in Vilnius. Previously, Sarunas was responsible for a  growth fund established under JEREMIE program in Lithuania and led BaltCap’s investment in greenfield  development of 24MW wind farm. Prior to joining BaltCap, he worked in a  regional corporate finance boutique. Sarunas has finished Project and Infrastructure Finance Programme at London Business School and  has a Bachelor’s degree in Finance Management from Kaunas University of  Technology.

Rebecca Svensøy General Counsel FSN Capital

Rebecca has been the General Counsel at FSN Capital since 2015, and is also heading up the FSN Capital ESG team. FSN Capital is Pan-European mid-market buyout firm, currently investing Fund V, which was closed at hard cap of 1 Bn EUR in 2016. Before joining FSN Capital, Rebecca worked several years as an M&A lawyer at the law firm Schjødt in Oslo, Norway. She was also the General Counsel of Validus (FSN Capital Fund IV investment) for 1,5 years before joining FSN Capital. Rebecca holds a Cand. Jur (Master’s in law) from the University of Oslo, as well as an MBA from Bond University, Australia.

Jonas Svensson Partner & Senior Claims Adjuster, Attorney at law RiskPoint

Jonas Svensson is practice leader for M&A claims for the RiskPoint group and has extensive experience in dealing with M&A claims. He Joined RiskPoint in 2016 having worked as a Senior Claims Adjuster in AIG focusing on Financial Lines. Prior to that he worked for the largest law firm in Denmark where he focused on complex litigation. Since 2012 he has been teaching at the University of Copenhagen, latest as an external lecturer in specialized tort law and law of obligations. He holds an LL.M in law from the University of Copenhagen and is a trained attorney.

Hans Swolin Co-Head Transactional Risk Insurance Europe, Middle East & Africa, Head of Nordics Private Equity and M&A Marsh JLT Specialty

Hans assumed the position as Co-Head Transactional Risk Insurance for Europe, Middle East & Africa alongside leading the Nordics Private Equity and M&A practice with the combined Marsh JLT Specialty in 2019 and is based in Stockholm.Hans was formerly a Senior Partner with legacy JLT’s Northern M&A team as well as Credit, Political and Security risk team practice and joined legacy JLT in 2012 to primarily build the successful M&A/W&I practice. Prior to joining JLT, Hans was a Senior Group Legal counsel at the HQ for Ericsson for ca. five years doing global M&A and financing work for Ericsson and a board member of the insurance and reinsurance captives of Ericsson and before that Hans was a practising transaction lawyer for a number of years with the Swedish magic circle firm Mannheimer Swartling in Sweden and Allen & Overy in London (after having served as a junior judge for a brief period following studies of LLM in Lund, Sweden and abroad and military service in military intelligence).

Ingrid Teigland Akay Managing Partner Hadean Ventures

Ingrid is a medical doctor and investment professional with background in healthcare, consumer goods and technology. She is founder and managing partner of Hadean Ventures, a European life science fund manager. Prior to starting Hadean Ventures, Ingrid served as a senior investment professional at London-based Inventages. As a medical doctor, Ingrid worked within general medicine and surgery, with exposure to both the public and private sector. Ingrid holds a medical degree from Medizinische Hochschule Hannover,Germany, and an MBA with Finance Concentration from London Business School.

Kasper Viio Corporate Development Executive Acuris Global

Kasper works as a Corporate  Development Executive at Acuris, focused on both organic- and  acquisitive growth initiatives. 

He joined Mergermarket’s  editorial team ten years ago, covering several public- and private market  M&A beats in Europe before moving on to strategy related roles in 2013.  Kasper still occasionally lends his byline to editorial- and events teams, but  struggles to remember how many times he has chaired the Nordic Forum.

In his spare time, he advises a  London based venture capital firm on fund strategy, communication and investor  relations, and is working hard to convince his young daughter about the merits  of downhill skiing.

Fredrik vom Hofe Group Senior Vice President, Business Development and member of the Group Executive Committee IFS AB

Fredrik vom Hofe is Group Senior Vice President, Business Development and member of the Group Executive Committee, at IFS.

He is passionate about making business and people grow! Having spent more than 25 years in business value driving operational roles within the global tech industry he is obsessed with helping customers transform their businesses to deliver more value by leveraging digitalization.

Fredrik joined IFS in 2003 as Senior Vice President, Group Marketing, Industry Sales & Partner Management. He has held his current position since 2006.

In his role, Fredrik is responsible for the Business Development Unit and for driving group-wide strategic and customer value driving growth and business transformation initiatives, including Mergers & Acquisitions, divestments, establishing joint ventures and new partnerships. Fredrik is co-opted at the board of directors of IFS AB.

Prior to joining IFS, Fredrik worked as Senior Manager at Cap Gemini Ernest & Young, and in senior executive roles within general management, sales, consulting and marketing at Framfab, Ericsson and Asea Brown Boveri in Sweden, Germany, Australia and New Zealand.

Fredrik has a Master of Science degree in industrial manufacturing and management from Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden), including studies at the University of California at Berkeley (US) and Diplomas in Corporate Finance from Stockholm School of Economics.

In his spare time, Fredrik likes mountain climbing, trekking and skiing with his family.

Erik Wall Partner PwC Strategy&

Erik Wall is the Strategy& leader in Sweden. Based in Stockholm, he is a Partner with PwC Sweden. Erik has over 20 years of consulting experience and works across the Nordics and Europe, mainly with the Private Equity, Technology, Software and the Media & Entertainment industries. Erik also holds significant experience from business services, real estate and the construction sector. Erik has advised more than 300 transactions with strategy and CDD, both sell side and buy side across all continents.

Gareth Whiley Managing Partner Silverfleet Capital

Gareth joined Silverfleet Capital in 1997 and became Managing Partner in 2019. Gareth heads a team of partners and staff who are located in London, Munich, Paris, Amsterdam and Stockholm. He is currently a Non-Executive Director of Riviera Travel, having previously been a director of a number of former portfolio companies including Phase One, Masai, Cimbria, OFFICE, Phadia and Oasis. Gareth qualified as a solicitor with Linklaters before moving into corporate finance, initially with the investment bank SG Warburg and later within Guinness plc. Gareth studied Mathematics and Law at Girton College, Cambridge University.

Philip Whitchelo VP, Head of Market Insight & Analysis Intralinks

Philip is the Head of Market Insight & Analysis at Intralinks, where he has been a member of the leadership team since 2010. He is an Honorary Visiting Fellow in the Faculty of Finance at Cass Business School, City, University of London, and is also a member of the Advisory Board of the M&A Research Centre at Cass. Philip is a globally recognised expert and speaker in the theory and practice of M&A and is the co-author of over a dozen M&A research studies. He began his career at Deloitte in London and has 25 years' experience working in M&A, corporate development and strategy roles across investment banking, high-growth, private equity backed, pre-IPO and large public companies.

Tim Wright Partner, Head of European Private Equity DLA Piper

Tim Wright heads up the European Private Equity group and has been specialising in private equity for over 20 years. He acts for private equity sponsors, management teams and corporates on a variety of UK and cross-border private equity backed buyouts and corporate M&A.

Clara Zverina Director Altor

Clara joined Altor in 2014 and is a member of the board of KonfiDents. She was previously at Credit Suisse IBD, McKinsey, National Bureau of Economic Research. She has a BA (Hons) from Oxford University, MPA and Ph.D. in Public Policy / Economics from Harvard University.