VC Value Creation Strategies

Fiona is a financial professional with more than 30 years of experience in scaling start-ups as a founder, company director and corporate advisor. Living in Cambridge, she’s managed numerous corporate finance transactions, including London IPOs, reverse takeovers and M&A. Fiona is a strong proponent of EDI and sustainable businesses, has an MBA from University of the Witwatersrand and is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment.

Madin Akpo-Esambe is an investment lead and operating partner at Tacoma Venture Fund. He leads deals across industries, but has a particular interest in new innovations that disrupt legacy systems. Madin built his career scaling hyper growth startups as the head of strategy and operations at Divvy Homes and Built Technologies and as an entrepreneur at his own travel-tech startup, Trava. Madin began his career at Goldman Sachs and as a growth strategy consultant at The Cambridge Group where his passion for studying businesses, building relationships, and listening to customers to drive actionable strategic insights took root. A second generation Cameroonian immigrant, Madin is passionate about advancing diverse representation in tech and business and throughout his career has served as a mentor and board member of several community access non-profits. He’s an alumni of Northwestern University where he studied economics and organizational management. In his spare time he loves trying new restaurants and recipes with his wife and exploring Seattle’s parks with their two dogs.

Connor McKenna is the VP of Pronghorn Investment Management Company, leading investment sourcing, diligence, and structuring processes, while partnering with portfolio companies to accelerate growth. Pronghorn is a standalone business focused on creating a template for effectively diversifying any industry. Starting with the spirits industry, Pronghorn is laying the groundwork to develop a scalable methodology that can be applied to other industries and communities in the future. By leveraging capital investment, incubation, and recruitment initiatives, Pronghorn is actively building this template by accelerating access to the spirits industry for under tapped businesses and individuals Connor’s professional experience includes Global Finance & Strategy for ZX Ventures, and Corporate Strategy for Diageo North America. Connor holds an MBA in Finance and Entrepreneurship from Columbia Business School, and a B.A. in Philosophy from Colby College.