River Capital Partners

Peter Hiscocks - Rivers Capital Partners

Peter is a director and founder of Rivers Capital. He also built the entrepreneurship resources within the University of Cambridge, from the original Cambridge Entrepreneurship Centre to Cambridge Enterprise and achieved a considerable increase in the level of commercialisation. He is currently head of Innovation Management at the Judge Business School and is managing several research projects on the success factors for new hi tech business ventures.

He is a chemist by training and has experience in a number of major corporations, consultancy and university start-up and commercialisation of technology. Peter is also the principal inventor on six patents, Chairman of Podpoint the EV charging point company and is on the Board of three others: he has achieved two successful exits. 

Jonathan Gold - Rivers Capital Partners

Jonathan is the director and founder of Rivers Capital. He was also a founding director of NStar in 2003 and set up Finance Tree following a management buyout of part of NStar in 2008. A specialist on investment readiness, concept and seed finance, Jonathan has a background in business development with extensive experience of the Japanese market from working in AEA Technology. 

He established several early stage seed capital and venture funds attracting capital from public and private sources for investment in small companies and academic spin-out companies. He has created several early stage funds worth in total £19m including the Rainbow Seed Fund and a range of funds in the North of England. He served as the Chief Executive of NorthStar Equity Investors, for its first year of operation, overseeing the creation and establishment of the £10m Proof of Concept Fund and a £23m Co-Investment Fund. His first degree is chemistry and he has a diploma in Marketing and is a full professional member of the CIM and IoD.

Alan Fletcher - Square One Law LLP

Alan is an experienced corporate lawyer and a founding partner of Square One Law. Prior to this Alan was a Partner with Eversheds for over six years, firstly as head of the corporate team in Newcastle and more recently as Senior Office Partner of the Edinburgh office which was opened as a green field operation in Spring 2009. There Alan was responsible for strategy, management and people, in addition to leading a number of client relationships.

As well as being qualified in both Scottish and English law Alan also qualified as a chartered accountant with Arthur Andersen before working for Ernst & Young in Newcastle. During almost 20 years in professional practice Alan has been responsible for the provision of the whole range of corporate services, including M & A, refinancing, IPOs, joint ventures, corporate governance and company secretarial matters.

Alan also has experience of the pressures and issues facing in house counsel having spent 10 months on secondment with Bank of Scotland at the time of its merger with Lloyds Banking Group. There he managed a portfolio of distressed corporate connections which held significant real estate assets and in which the bank had both debt and equity exposure. Connections managed included house builders, hotel groups, property investors and developers. He previously spent three months on secondment with the Scottish Football Association where he worked on the establishment of the Scottish Premier League and the redevelopment of Hampden Park.

David Pope - Finance Tree

David has twelve years experience at Brewin Dolphin Securities Plc in the corporate broking team. During this period David specialised in Leisure and Media investments and led numerous fund raisings and transactions. This more recently led to a corporate finance appointment at a radio business which culminated in the sale of nine radio stations to multiple buyers. David has an MBA from Durham University and is a fellow of The Securities & Investment Institute.