Fund manager unveils vastly experienced new team

Andy Moss

One of the Midlands best-known finance professionals is set to head up a new team in charge of a £40m fund.

The FSE Group has announced a new head and team for its £40m Midlands Engine Investment Fund (MEIF). This follows the British Business Bank appointing FSE as seventh MEIF fund manager earlier this year. It is investing between £100,000 and £1.5m in firms based across the Midlands.

The FSE Group’s MEIF team will be led by Andy Moss. Moss comes to FSE from Lloyds, where he has spent more than 34 years. He has led teams across the SME sector, where he specialised in manufacturing and for the last three years has worked with large corporates.

Moss is joined by four fund managers and a fund executive. They are:

– Chirag Mistry is the newest member of the FSE team in the Midlands, having spent the last 13 years with Santander. Mistry is also a Sutton Coldfield Chamber of Commerce committee member and will be working with high growth businesses in the West Midlands, focusing on Worcestershire, The Marches, Coventry & Warwickshire and Greater Birmingham & Solihull.

– Kerry Haughton is a fund manager who, before joining FSE, spent 14 years working in various commercial and corporate relationship banking roles for Thincats and RBS, both onshore and offshore. Haughton is working to support SME growth in the West Midlands, focusing on The Black Country, Stoke-on-Trent & Staffordshire as well as Greater Birmingham & Solihull, along with Mistry.

– Fund manager, Paul Lynam, joined FSE after almost 37 years with HSBC. He is now applying his experience in the commercial banking sector to helping SMEs in the East and South East Midlands unlock their growth potential, focusing on Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire.

– David Price joined HSBC over 40 years ago, where he spent the majority of his banking career, working as both a branch manager and a commercial lending manager across several different sectors. He is FSE’s second fund manager for the East and South East Midlands, focusing on Leicestershire, Northamptonshire and other areas of the South East Midlands.

The team is completed by fund executive, Harriet Saunders. After graduating from University of Bath with a Business Administration degree, Saunders spent time working in financial support roles, including as a fund administrator for Mercia Asset Management, before joining FSE earlier this year.

The FSE Group’s chief executive, Paul Marston, said: “We are delighted to welcome Andy to FSE and our Midlands team. The FSE Group has been specialising in SME lending, with a particular focus on managing government and public sector intervention funds, since 2002. Andy’s commercial lending expertise, combined with his regional knowledge is a great fit and welcome addition, which will be put to good use managing the team and supporting growing SMEs throughout the Midlands.”

Moss added: “The FSE Group is a niche lender with a unique approach, focusing on business potential, rather than security available, to help growing businesses reach their full potential. I am excited to be part of this dynamic team and look forward to leading the successful delivery of this latest MEIF funding.”

Grant Peggie, director at the British Business Bank, said: “It is great to see The FSE Group has a full MEIF team in place, headed up by Andy, who we look forward to working with. MEIF is still very much open for business, especially at a time when firms are reaching out even more for financial support. We are pleased that The FSE Group also now joins our other regional fund managers, BCRS Business Loans and First Enterprise as an accredited lender under the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loans Scheme.”

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