Guest Speaker:
Alan D Neilson
Founder of BlueBird
Tuesday 1 December 2008
As part of the Liebman Series in International Business, the founder of BlueBird start-up fund, Alan Nielson, presented to the Hult community how the global credit crisis was affecting start-up funds and venture capital organizations.
Before founding BlueBird, Alan D Neilson was the CEO and a founding director of the London Stock Exchange quoted Fidessa Group plc. His experience with corporate finance, due diligence and acquisitions as part of Fidessa's growth, plus his work with smaller, early stage technology companies, led him to form BlueBird in 2007 to identify, fund and guide smaller information industry companies to acquisition or flotation.
Alan described his experiences with BlueBird with particular emphasis on selecting his partners, raising the capital needed for his first transactions, and doing his first deals. He emphasized how underlying assumptions about the global environment where dramatically changed by the extraordinary increase in uncertainty now occurring. Yet, he stressed, thoughtful and careful fund managers could still find opportunities and make money in these turbulent times.
It was a fantastic presentation, and the student audience kept Mr. Nielson talking informally for an hour after his presentation.