The LIFE Board
Charles Hall - Director
Charles is the joint founder and CEO of SolarEmpower Limited. He trained as an investment banker with Philips and Drew (UBS) in the early 1970s, before leaving to launch and direct a fine wine investment business. He returned to the City in 1985, working as a senior sales executive for Greenwell Montagu, Smith New Court and Merrill Lynch until 2000. Charles then joined Katalyst Ventures, a private equity businesses focused on financing entrepreneurs. He jointly launched The Katalyst Hydrogen Fund which was the world’s first alternative energy hedge fund. In 2003 Charles left Katalyst to co-found his own business Westhall Capital (www.westhallcapital.com), an FSA regulated independent investment advisory business focused on “Mega-trends”: Asia, TMT and Alternative Energy. Charles advised institutional investors on alternative energy investments, and raised funds for Freepower (www.freepower.com) and LIFE. Charles remains a non-executive Director of Westhall and is a FSA regulated investment advisor. He has dedicated his last eight years to creating businesses that contribute to sustainability with the personal conviction that solutions are available if we fully engage with the biggest natural resource of all. He formed SolarEmpower in 2006 with Barry Clive.
Matthew Brown - Director
Matthew Brown spent most of his professional life in Spain, where he worked for Lehman Brothers, the American investment bank, and headed up the Corporate Finance function for a strategy consulting firm before moving to Amadeus, the quoted travel technology company, as Corporate Development Manager. In 1999 he returned to the UK to found and run a VC-backed mobile technology venture. He has worked as a freelance business strategy consultant and as a Deal Manager for Advantage Business Angels. Matthew holds a BSc (Hons) in Systems Management from The City University, an MSc in Environmental Technology from Imperial College London and an MBA from Manchester Business School
Philip Johnson - Director
Philip Johnson has extensive experience in the electricity sector having held a variety of executive and senior management positions covering all aspects of the supply chain. His previous appointments include periods with Ocean Power, National Power, Coopers and Lybrand, North of Scotland Hydro Electric Board, British Electricity International and the Central Electricity Generating Board with whom he originally undertook a student apprenticeship. He has built a number of successful new energy businesses including Innogy (now RWE Innogy), npower CoGen and National Power Energy Direct the first direct supply business following electricity privatisation in England and Wales. Philip is a Chartered Engineer and holds an MBA (Insigni Laude) from Glasgow University and a B.Sc. (Hons) in Energy Technology from Aston University; he is a fellow of the Energy Institute.
Steve Dore - Director
Steve is an experienced business support professional and serial entrepreneur. Since 1983 when he formed International Innovation Services Ltd he has provided consultancy support to regional, national and international business support agencies including RDAs, governments, the EU and the United Nations. Steve’s particular expertise lies in designing and implementing cluster development strategies and regional innovation, incubation and technology acceleration programmes. Since 1989 he has personally advised over 400 start-ups. He was the prime mover behind the development of LIFE and undertook all the seminal work founding LIFE in 2001. Steve is the CEO of International Innovation Services Ltd, TCS Systems Limited and NoMo-ir Limited. He is currently advising on the establishment of new business accelerators and technology accelerators in the UK and Europe.