AHR Corporate Advisory Services bolsters executive leadership team
AHR Corporate Advisory Services has today announced the addition of three senior partners to its executive leadership team. Co-founders and managing Partners, Steve Drake and Stephen Watson, will be joined by John Martin St.Valery, OBE, Claire Duce and Greg Francis.
Both John and Claire bring a wealth of practical regional business experience, while Greg brings invaluable operational finance experience to the AHR Corporate Advisory Services team.
John Martin St.Valery, OBE, appointed as an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of The British Empire in Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II New Year’s Honours 2022, for Services to British Businesses in the UAE, is a veteran of the Middle East with more than 24 years’ experience in the region. John founded, built and sold the region’s leading company formation and restructuring specialist firm, Links Group. Since selling his business, John has continued to support businesses by identifying opportunities to effectively scale to accelerate growth and/or prepare businesses for acquisition, joint venture or capital raising.
Claire Duce is an ex-Big 4 senior advisory partner with more than 30 years’ professional advisory experience, the last 14 of which have been served in the Middle East. As an advisory partner Claire worked extensively in Europe and the Middle East supporting clients of all sizes with their business challenges. Claire specialises in the area of governance, risk and controls, with her most recent Big 4 role being the regional business controls risk leader.
Greg Francis is a career served finance executive with a diverse background in corporate strategy, business operations and finance. He started his career as a chartered accountant with KPMG in South Africa and England and has since enjoyed more than 30 years’ experience in senior financial and executive positions in Europe, North America and latterly the Middle East/sub-Saharan Africa.
Steve Drake & Stephen Watson, managing partners of AHR CAS said: “We are delighted to be welcoming John, Claire and Greg to the executive leadership team. As we continue to grow the AHR Corporate Advisory Services business and brand, the time was right to accelerate our senior leadership team by admitting three very experienced partners to the team. The trio bring a wealth of experience across multiple disciplines and sectors that will be highly relevant to our clients. As our brand grows and our market offerings develop, the experience the partners bring will be truly transformative to our clients.
“We strongly believe the SME sector is underserved not only in our region but more globally and so the addition of John, Claire and Greg will support our purpose of bringing a distinctive top-tier consulting experience to our SME clients, wherever they may be located.”