Meet The Team

Partner responsible for Operations, Finance and Investments
Ankur Kamalia
Ankur has spent the last 20+years as a venture investor in fintech, education and healthcare and an investment banker across Asia, US and Europe with DB1 Ventures, Polygon, UBS and Quantum. His passion lies in enabling, mentoring, investing in and co-creating next generation businesses that play a positive role in shaping our future.

Partner responsible for Governance, Integrity and Community”
Gavin Hughes
Gavin leads from his heart as a performance-oriented business executive focusing on impact enterprises and charitable endeavours post his successful exit from a private family company. Gavin is passionate about and motivated by connection to people, spirit and energy.

Founding Partner and CEO
Simon Hampel
Simon spent between 1993-2001 as a serial entrepreneur, building companies in Europe, the US and Canada in the fields of financial services, leisure, consultancy and technology. In 2002 he lost everything. He joined an expedition to the Amazon and spent the next four years leading further expeditions and living with local communities in the Amazon, across the Himalayas, through Mongolia, and down Ethiopia’s Blue Nile.
In 2006, he became the CEO of Right to Sight, an International NGO tackling needless blindness, and worked on developing sustainable eye care projects across Africa and India. Most recently, he was a Managing Partner of Leaders’ Quest.
In parallel in 2010 Simon found himself in a Zen monastery in Tamil Nadu where he had a series of powerful awakening experiences which have carved his path forward. These energetic experiences opened up not just his curiosity but a visceral yearning to engage in sharing how this growth and personal transformation is open to us all.

Partner responsible for Light Product and Technology
Katherine Maree Pace
Katherine is an international award-winning product designer with success in raising venture capital, securing corporate partnerships and leading design and engineering teams to co-create the unseen, unheard or unimagined. Having lived and worked across Scandinavia, the USA and Asia Pacific for 15+ years, Katherine’s expertise spans a significant number of subject areas from game design to hardware integrations, social networks, pricing models, brand development, project management and more. Katherine thrives on leading teams to draw on diverse and complex bodies of knowledge to solve specific problems and is constantly re-inspired by models of biomimicry. She lives by the motto; Look up, look-out or look-in. When not at work, you’ll find Katherine dancing salsa, meditating or enjoying moments of ‘hygge’ with friends and family.

Creative Partner responsible for Light Brand
Colm Roche
With his agency, Imagist, Colm works with organisations like Nike, Clinique and Unilever. He digs deep to discover the simplest truths behind a brand, and finds ways to express them in a way that fundamentally resonates with the brand’s audience. In 2014, he set up a podcast platform called Radio Wolfgang, creating multi-award winning content with notable individuals and brands such as Greenpeace, Selfridges, Soho House.

Council Guardian
Stuart Pickles
Ex-CFO, Stuart spent 25 years in the food/drinks industry with Unilever, Kraft Foods and Foster’s, and now runs leadership coaching consultancy, Aim Higher Leadership Ltd. He is passionate about seeking solutions for climate justice and social justice. He is an associate with Sarsen, and also Leaders’ Quest / LSP Leadership (Leading Sustainable Performance) and CCA (Climate Coaching Alliance).

Lead Council Guardian
Kathryn Hodnett
Kathryn specialises in executive coaching, top team facilitation and leadership development across a broad range of industries. She listens deeply, achieves high levels of trust and inspires and motivates people to new levels of engagement, action and performance.

Product & Content - Design Lead
Jess Edwards
Jess is a freelance director and screenwriter, represented by international creative agency Curtis Brown, with a portfolio career spanning facilitation, live illustration, and experience design. She is a Queer artist, uses therapeutic techniques to help artists explore autobiography and trauma. Her work has appeared in London's West End, the Edinburgh Festival, and the cabaret theatres of Berlin.
As a facilitator, she specialises in design thinking, with clients such as the NHS, Barclays and Deloitte. She helps large groups of people solve complex problems, and encourages participants to hold reflective space for bold thinking. Jess believes we all deserve a good story. Her work is about helping people to discover their authentic story, and tell it better.

Client Relationships and Business Development Lead
Grania Chesterton
Grania is a seasoned project director with over 10 years’ experience running international events across the renewable energy, sustainable high-end travel and tech spaces. Trilingual, vibrant and with a passion for connecting people, she is dedicated to working with communities to forge meaningful change and become forces for good.

Business Operations
Nicole D'lima
Nicole is a process driven professional with a demonstrated track record of connecting a diversity of people, while supporting the execution of the key corporate objectives. Proficient at managing strategic accounts, building solid long-term relationships, effective customer life cycle management, she is a quick learner who adapts to varying situations and excels in taking initiative in challenging situations. Her experience has been with The Walt Disney Company and EdelGive Foundation in the areas of corporate communications, partnerships management and brand management.

Operations Lead
Shilpa Jain
Shilpa started her career as an HR professional and then engaged in extensive pro bono work with the Isha Foundation for almost two decades, handling varied responsibilities and gaining deep expertise into various aspects of fundraising, nurturing relationships and organising events, ranging from exclusive to mega.
With a comeback into the corporate space as Head-Partnerships at EdelGive, she grew into a purpose-led leader with integrity and sharp focus on tangible business results. This was followed with a stint at Mumbai Angels Network. With business development and client engagement, she also led the mandate to facilitate fundraise for global startups from Indian Investors.
Shilpa is a MCom from University of Mumbai with a Diploma in Personnel Management; and is an avid painter, yoga enthusiast and a trained classical dancer.

Creative Partner responsible for SARSEN Brand
Steffen Stauber
Creative Director, strategist, consultant with expertise in communication, design, branding and technology stemming from years at positions ranging from Creative Director at BBDO and Head of Innovation at SinnerSchrader to Founder and CEO of Create Meaning, an independent consulting studio where his focus is to empower leaders to make a meaningful impact in the world.

Strategic Advisor
Ben Reid
22+ years experience in product, technology and commercialisation – has worked in depth with over 100+ companies spanning ASX100 through to technology startups and scaleups. Ben specialises in media platforms, health-tech, mobile and pursues a broad set of interests including blockchain, design systems and positive psychology / flow. Ben is a proud dad of 3 kids and passionate about the role of entrepreneurship to create global impact and enterprises for good.

Film-maker
Shelly Nel
Shelly is a self-shooting Director who has honed an understanding of what a short film can achieve in an environment of visual excess. Informed through working in diverse fields, from commercials to documentary, broadcast to online series, for creatives and corporates, she believes that intuition and a flexible approach are essential to achieving a unique and authentic film.
Her ability to gain the trust of contributors allows unique insights into their thinking and projects. She believes that the documentation of beauty in the visual detail elevates a story above the ordinary and what unfolds naturally is often more potent than a scripted outcome.
In a world driven by moving images and self promotion she strives to create films which are honest, emotive, empowering and memorable.