Andy Hunter School and University was spent playing football, rugby and in the bar with a few exams thrown in! Andy then spent several years in the oil and gas business both on and off-shore from London to Libya via Scotland, Norway and Holland. Having spent a year at Cranfield studying for an MBA, Andy then became the Principle Consultant with Hoskyns in Financial Services and then Facilities Management. Andy started Swallow Information Systems Ltd - in 1990. Swallow is now a leading provider of Customer Services software, Charter, in the UK and the United States. Customers include McDonalds, Harrods, Selfridges, Next, Thames Water, 11 Train Operating Companies, Anheuser Busch, Staples, O2 (BT Cellnet), CIS, Toyota, Mitsubishi, WH Smith, First Choice and Centrica Charter captures, manages, resolves and provides tactical and strategic management information on customer activity. Andy has experience in raising finance and raised close to £5m in investment funding through Business Angel and City institutions. Julia Uttley Julia is a co-founder of Equador, a consultancy and systems integrator focused on the telecommunications industry. She has just completed a successful merger of the company with CH2M HILL, a US-based global project delivery company with revenues of $2.6 billion. With 15 years telecommunications experience gained in sales, marketing and product management disciplines, Julia has a thorough understanding of the industry. As a software analyst for Scicon and Royal Blue, Julia built an appreciation of communications applications in the areas of CATV, datacomms and financial trading. She spent four years at BT, initially as a consultant in the Finance Sector Account Management group then as a marketing manager, where she was responsible for VPN and Managed Bandwidth Services. Before founding Equador, Julia was recruited into a newly formed team at Sprint International. In her two years at Sprint, Julia was instrumental in developing a £17 million business, from start-up. The role involved Julia in all aspects of product marketing including revenue forecasting, product planning and development, product positioning and pricing, sales support, marketing communications, product launch event and general PR. Julia has a degree in Computer Sciences and an MBA. Michael Taylor Following his call to the English Bar in 1986, Michael served as In-House Counsel at the construction company Kyle Stewart Limited. In 1988 Michael was appointed sole In-House Counsel to the MK Electric Group (part of the RTZ Group). Between 1990 and 1993 Michael held a number of high level positions at Mercury Communications, the UK's first licensed operator authorized to provide public telecommunications services in competition with BT ("the duopoly era"). In 1993 Michael was appointed Director of Legal and Regulatory affairs at ACC Long Distance Limited, the first operator to be granted an International Simple Resale License in the UK ("the post duopoly era"). Between 1996 and 1999 Michael served as Deputy General Counsel to the global mobile personal communications satellite operator, ICO Global Communications. At ICO, Michael provided legal and regulatory support in North, South and Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, South Africa, India and the Far East. While at ICO Michael chaired the interconnect working group of the European Telecommunications Platform in Brussels with the remit of producing a pan European framework interconnect agreement. Michael presented the framework agreement to the Commission who accepted it for use by operators and service providers across Europe. From 1999 to 2001 Michael served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel to FirstMark Communications Europe. FirstMark, a Luxembourg company launched in 1999 and headquartered in the UK with operating companies across Europe, was set up as a pan European operator providing wireless broadband access services and backbone fibre connectivity. In the first two years the company raised in excess of US$1.1 billion in private equity and vendor finance. Main board directors included Lynn Forester, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, Conrad Black, Henry Kissinger, Bert Roberts and Vernon Jordan. Michael was responsible for managing a team of lawyers across Europe and was closely involved in a number of fixed wireless frequency auctions and competitive tender license processes. Founder of the ONSLOWgroup in 2001 with offices in London, Paris and Thailand providing legal, regulatory, tax, funding and business development services to clients in industry and to law firms. Peter Hase After a 7-year period working as a commercial Insurance Broker, Peter moved into Telecoms in 1983, joining Norton Telecom as a Sales Account Manager. Peter then moved into data comms, joining Tricom and then Racal Milgo, where he moved into senior management. At this time, 1988, the market was moving towards Managed Services and Peter was appointed as National Sales Manager for Midland network Services. This company undertook an MBO and then was sold for over £25 million in 1993. Peter then helped set up Saturn Global Network (a financial niche Global Managed Network provider), which was then sold IXnet in 1998 for £30 million. Peter, having been a main board director for Saturn Global, became the European MD for IXnet, and he helped with the NASDAQ IPO, in 1999. This business was sold to Global Crossing in June 2000 and at this point, Peter moved to Interxion (a new emerging European Internet hosting and housing business) where he worked a CEO Consultancy and Group MD, until December 2001. Peter helped Interxion raise in excess of € 280 Million of new equity funding in 2001. To date, Peter has been operating as an independent consultant (PHASE4CONSULTING), focusing on strategic projects and business change innovations. Clients include Interxion, Synstar and Speakerbus Group.