Claire is Founder & Managing Partner of Connection Capital, a private client investment business specialising in alternative investments. Claire’s career began as a private equity investor at 3i having graduated in Banking & International Finance from Loughborough University. After some years in financial recruitment, she co-founded a private client investment business which she sold out of in 2009 before co-founding Connection Capital in 2010. Connection Capital was established by a team who share the same aim: to give its private and family office clients access to alternative investments which are available to the institutional market but often closed to private investors.

The firm’s innovative syndicated model pools its clients’ capital on a deal by deal or fund by fund basis meaning investors can access opportunities which would usually be out of reach due to minimum investment size.

Connection Capital clients can invest on a self-select basis so a bespoke portfolio can be built up over time. Opportunities can broadly be classified as either direct private equity, private debt and commercial property investments or pooled allocations to alternative asset funds. Connection Capital’s team manages over £500m across these products. Due to the nature of Connection Capital’s business, Claire has experience of sitting on both sides of the private equity/private debt fence: as part of the investment committee overseeing Connection Capital’s own-led deals and also as an LP investor in other firms’ funds.