Jonathan Thompson will play a key role in further building out Laeceum’s financial services advisory capability following 4 years as Founder and CEO of Bank North, the SME focused challenger, where he piloted the firm through a full UK PRA/FCA regulatory bank licence approval process, including development of an integrated cloud-native technology platform and subsequent launch of lending activities, before completing an asset disposal to its anchor investor in Q4 2022.
“Having built and launched a new SME bank during and immediately post Covid, originating a pipeline of over £250m mid-market lending opportunities and growing a fully-performing lending book of over £18m in just 9 months, Jonathan’s addition to the Laeceum team will lend further weight to our CEO advisory proposition, our SME data & analytics capability and our emerging debt advisory capability, ” said Ravi Chauhan, Laeceum Founder & Managing Director. ” Furthermore, Jonathan’s significant experience in building world class teams and fundraising in highly regulated markets will help us satisfy growing demand for independent advisory support from high potential UK and European fintechs.”
Jonathan Thompson said, “Having seen Ravi and the Laeceum team in action over the past few years I am excited at the prospect of being able to leverage my SME neo-challenger banking and debt advisory expertise for the benefit of Laeceum’s growing client base, especially aspirant neobanks and fintechs.”
Prior to Bank North, Thompson held senior leadership roles at Santander, Deloitte and Lloyds Banking Group in a range of leveraged finance, debt advisory and SME lending roles. He holds a B.Sc from UMIST (University of Manchester).
