Brand Finance Annual Forum 2023

David is the Chairman and CEO of Brand Finance Plc – the world’s leading brand valuation consultancy. He has worked in the area of branded business, brand, and intangible asset valuation since 1991. He specialised entirely in the field after becoming the Director of Brand Valuation for Interbrand in 1995. He subsequently left Interbrand in 1996 to launch Brand Finance which is celebrating 25 years in business this year.

David represented the British Standards Institution in the working parties responsible for crafting international industry standards: ISO 10668 on Brand Valuation in 2010 and ISO 20671 on Brand Evaluation in 2019.

David is a passionate writer and has authored many articles on brand valuation, published in numerous marketing and finance newspapers and magazines, such as: Financial Times, Accountancy Age, and Marketing Week. He has also lectured on the topic of brand valuation for Harvard, Chicago, and London Business Schools.

David graduated from Bristol University with an English degree, qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Price Waterhouse in London, and obtained a postgraduate diploma in Marketing from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM). He is a Fellow of The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and has a practising certificate with the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW).

Brigitte joined LSEG as Chief Corporate Affairs and Marketing Officer in September 2020. She leads the Group's Communications, Government Relations, Regulatory Strategy, Sustainability and Marketing functions. She also chairs the LSEG Foundation Board.

Brigitte has more than 30 years’ corporate affairs experience at Virgin Media, Lloyds Banking Group, ICAP and ITV plc. Earlier in her career, she worked at Dow Jones, publisher of the Wall Street Journal, leading its global communications from New York.

Brigitte is also a global advisory board member of NewsGuard Technologies, an organisation that provides transparent tools to counter misinformation.

She is a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge University.

is the co-editor of the Global Innovation Index (GII) at the Department for Economics and Data Analytics of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

She has worked as a researcher, policy analyst, and consultant in the field of research and innovation for over 15 years, including for various services of the European Commission, UNESCO and the OECD. Before joining WIPO, Lorena designed and developed various innovation and entrepreneurship scoreboards at the European level.

At WIPO, she acts as the Lead Researcher of the GII. Lorena is in charge of constructing and developing the statistical model and undertaking related data computations of the innovation index. She also provides ad hoc technical advice to countries on innovation policy and performance and innovation metrics.

Ms Rivera León has a PhD in Economics and Policy Studies of Technical Change from UNU-MERIT in the Netherlands. She received her Master of Arts jointly from the Department of Economics, University of British Columbia, Canada and the Université Grenoble Alpes, France.

Annie is a qualified management accountant and has worked on Brand and Business valuation projects serving global clients, including Barclays and Shell. She is experienced across of variety of services including brand licensing, research analytics, rebrand uplift and balance sheet valuation. Annie heads up various studies at Brand Finance, including the annual Global Intangible Finance Tracker (GIFT™) and the Brand Guardianship Index. In addition, Annie has conducted research and analysis for the Brand Finance brand rankings, specialising in Banking, Retail and Oil & Gas sectors. Annie has served clients worldwide, with a particular focus on the USA and the Middle East. Annie joined Brand Finance as an Analyst in August 2017 after graduating from The University of Edinburgh with a Masters degree in Philosophy and Economics. She has since completed her CIMA professional qualification.

Damon is a serial entrepreneur and investor with over 20  years’ experience in the creative and manufacturing sectors.  He has a track record across consumer and industrial product markets and within both direct-to-consumer and business-to-business channels.

He is specialised in launching product start-ups and disrupter brands into market and has a strong background in bootstrapping businesses through the concept and design stages into production and sales, driving value for founders, investors and shareholders.

Damon maintains a strong interest in the creative sector and works with numerous charities and not-for-profits providing mentoring to help start-ups from diverse backgrounds make a positive contribution to their communities.

Founder, NED - Tortilla Mexican Grill plc

NED ;  Red’s True Barbecue, Thunderbird Fried Chicken, Mama Roma Pizza.

Operating Partner - TriSpan Private Equityr

Alongside Tarek Gjonnes and Tim Prior, Brandon is a co-founder of Big Black Box, a startup which aims to be the ‘IMAX of Immersive Entertainment.’ Brandon is also the Founder and a Non-Executive Director of Tortilla Mexican Grill (LSE: MEX), the second largest fast-casual Mexican chain outside the United States. He sits on the board of Thunderbird Fried Chicken, a TriSpan portfolio company, and is a Non-Executive Director for Mamma Roma, a Belgian-based pizza business. He was previously founder/CEO of REVL, the UK’s largest events marketplace; Chairman of Red’s True Barbecue, the largest BBQ chain in the UK; and interim Director of eCommerce for Arcadia Group.

Brandon is a native Californian and began his career in Silicon Valley where he worked in a range of senior positions at several high-profile technology startups. He has also served as a consultant at Accenture and Booz Allen Hamilton. Brandon is a dual US/UK citizen, has an MBA from London Business School, and is a graduate of Princeton University.

Ashish Babu is the Chief Marketing Officer at Tata Consultancy Services, responsible for leading TCS’ brand, growth marketing and communications, for the UK & Europe region. With 22 years' experience across different markets and roles, Ashish developed countless marketing and communication campaigns that have won more than 40 awards globally and helped develop TCS’ brand. Prior to joining TCS, Ashish headed communications for Tata Sky. He started his career in Bangalore and since then moved to Delhi, Mumbai, London and now works in Amsterdam. Ashish lives in Hague and enjoys, Padel tennis, exploring the Dutch countryside on his gravel bike and spending time with his wife Candice and children Aarin and Aaliyah.

Ollie joined Fever-Tree in 2017 and has responsibility for internal and external communications, reputation management, ESG and public affairs.

Prior to joining Fever-Tree, Ollie was Managing Director for the strategic communications segment of FTI Consulting where he advised listed companies on their relationships with key stakeholders including investors and media. During his time at FTI he was on the team that supported Fever-Tree on their IPO on the LSE in 2014.

Hamza is Deputy Director for Business & Regulatory Policy at the Intellectual Property Office. Before his arrival at the IPO earlier this year, he had spent time in several Government departments, including DCMS and the Home Office. At the IPO, his portfolio covers IP finance and several other areas. He has undergraduate and postgraduate law degrees from the London School of Economics.