Mike Anstey / CEO & Co-Founder

Mike started his corporate career at the food and agriculture giant Cargill, thereafter embarking on his entrepreneurial journey, establishing a successful track record raising $90M funds, building and managing five of his own businesses worldwide which dealt with some of the largest global brands. In 2008, he pioneered the discipline of Venture Management and co-founded Pilot Lite, where he drives business development, leading the acceleration and commercialisation of innovation into market of their business for international growth. Mike has helped establish Pilot Lite operations in Africa, India, China and the US and has also launched new businesses for PepsiCo, Kraft Heinz, Unilever, Kimberly Clark, GSK and Diageo.  His education includes LGU and Oxford University Business School.

Stephen Hay / Chairman

Stephen is an experienced non-executive director and brings over 30 years of investment banking, research and consulting experience to Pilot Lite. Over a 20-year career at Goldman Sachs, including eight years as a managing director, he led sales teams, equity research departments and IT-related projects. In 2005, Stephen was a founding partner of Circle Healthcare, a new network of hospitals and rehabilitation facilities. Stephen’s focus at Pilot Lite is on healthcare, finance, governance and sustainability projects. His education includes BA Oxford, MBA London Business School and MSC Edinburgh University. He is a CFA charterholder.

Simon Haworth / Chief Investment Officer

Simon has a wealth of experience in structured and project finance, and has responsibility within Pilot Lite for investor relations, investment management and compliance. Prior to Pilot Lite, he was part of the founding management team at C12 Capital Management, a specialist fund manager with $13bn of credit market assets, followed by managing partner at Walbrook Capital, a private investment firm focused on real estate, renewable energy and structured credit.  Simon’s previous investment banking roles include Global Head of Execution at Barclays Capital and European and US origination roles at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, before which Simon was a solicitor in the Project and Asset Finance divisions of Linklaters and Latham & Watkins.  He holds a Masters from the University of Cambridge.

Pier Massa / PLV Regional Head - Europe

Pier brings more than 25 years of experience in executive management and consulting to Pilot Lite. He has an extensive track record building new businesses within large and complex organizations by leading enterprise-wide strategy development, business and market planning, process management, brand transformation and customer experience engineering. Pier has held executive leadership positions for major North American brands including Virgin, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Molson Breweries and SC Johnson Wax. He is also a former consultant at the Boston Consulting Group. At Pilot Lite, he is responsible for driving key operational relationships with all clients. Pier holds an MBA from the Rotman Business School (Toronto).

Sandy Westwater / CFO & Co-Founder

Sandy has honed his skills in strategy, venture management and marketing over a 20+ year career spanning the telecom, CPG, financial services and pharmaceutical industries. He has worked in both corporate roles, including P&G, and as a management consultant at PA Consulting.  Prior to co-founding Pilot Lite, Sandy helped launch Mobile Operator 3 (Three UK), as well as a successful dotcom subsidiary for one of the world’s largest financial services groups. In addition to serving as CFO at Pilot Lite, Sandy is involved with key client relationships.  His education includes MA Oxford and INSEAD CEDEP Management School.

Graham Hedger / Non-Executive Director

Graham is an experienced entrepreneur, with a 30 year track record of investment and development across a range of luxury residential and commercial projects across the South East and select locations in Europe, in addition to owning one of the largest gym operations in Kenya and a venture investment portfolio investment including Atis Foods (a health food concept in London), Azzuri (an African solar power company), Syrinix, Dash Water and Databricks.  Furthermore, Graham is an accomplished long distance runner, having completed in over 200 marathons, winning several prestigious races including the San Francisco ultra-marathon 6 years in a row.  He joins Pilot Lite as a co-investor at a time of exciting growth and opportunity for the business.

Dave Behringer / CEO PLV USA Inc

Dave is an award-winning Innovator and R&D executive that spent two decades at Kraft Foods helping to launch multiple $100M products, including the ‘Back to Nature’ brand and the ‘South Beach Diet’ line.  He was most recently the CTO at 915 Labs, an international food tech start-up. As CEO of Pilot Lite Ventures USA, Dave leads the North American Venture Management team.   Dave is a certified personal chef, holds a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Pennsylvania State University and has completed postgraduate innovation programs at University of Michigan, Stephen M Ross School of Business and the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Remi Rasenberg / Creative & Marketing Lead

Jonny Hewlett / PLV Venture Lead

Jonny has recently joined Pilot Lite bringing with him a great breadth and depth of C-suite level general management, trade marketing and commercial experience with three of the strongest companies in their respective fields, Marc Jacobs (LVMH), Diesel and P&G. He has a wealth of international business development experience, having worked in New York, Shanghai, Paris, Geneva and Milan establishing and implementing commercial strategies including trade terms, distribution and omnichannel marketing for these prestigious brands. A keen adventurer and sportsman, Jonny has completed extreme sports challenges including ultramarathons, ironman and a channel swim. A fluent French speaker, Jonny holds a BA (Joint Honours) in Management & French from Leeds University.