Some DD on Ark Capital Ventures
Company was set up by a man named Kasper Strandkov of London.
Kasper was the founder of Aurelius
http://aureliusplc.com/index.htm
Aurelius is heavy into the movie industry and has a rock solid team:
Stephen Greenwald
Stephen Greenwald – Has over 30 years of experience in structuring and implementing investment transactions in the real estate and media fields as a tax attorney, general partner and syndicator. Has extensive experience as a consultant to banks, lenders and investors in distressed corporate workouts. Served as the CEO of two public companies and several distressed companies at the request of lenders and investors. Served as a college president and taught law in the U.S. and abroad. Received LLB and LLM degrees from New York University School of Law, where he graduated first in his class. Stephen is also head of the the Jewish Lawyers Association of America.
stephen.greenwald@aureliusplc.com
Matthew Joynes
Matthew Joynes –founded Aurelius Investments plc in 2002, a corporate finance and treasury business which developed various businesses including one of the largest foreign exchange businesses in London. Prior to the sale of the foreign exchange business Aurelius turned over in excess of 3 billion GBP annually, delivered 110 million GBP in foreign exchange, and employed over 100 people across its various business lines. Aurelius Investments remains strong in special opportunities and alternate assets and developed an asset-backed receivables brokerage company that has facilitated and originated finance for film buyers/distributors and sales agents across Europe for five years. Matthew served as legal counsel for the BP and UBS. Trained as a lawyer at 1 Crown Office Row and was called to the Bar of England and Wales in 1994 (view practising certificate) and practiced common law and privy council law. Received a Bsc (Hons) and Masters degree in Economics.
matthew.joynes@aureliusplc.com
Carlos Melcer
Carlos Melcer – Has over 18 years of global finance experience and has participated in raising over $6 billion in debt and equity. For six years, Melcer was head of the International Division of HSBC’s Public Finance Subsidiary and structured the financing of some of the most complex transactions in the hemisphere, including large privatizations of public works, the structuring of NAFINSA’s $700 million Collateralized Loan Obligation, and the structuring and capitalization of the $3 billion North American Development Bank.
In 1996 Melcer funded the first B2B e-Commerce Software Platform Company, ISADRA, Inc., that was sold to Vertical Net in 1998. In 1998 Melcer started CIMA Capital in partnership with UPS Capital to manage their Merchant Banking Trade Finance Operations in key Latin American Markets. Mr. Melcer also started CIMA Ventures, a Venture Capital Angel Fund that raised over $24 million in Equity for technology start-up Companies. In 2009 Mr. Melcer became a Director at Aurelius Investments plc. Melcer also serves in the Board of Directors of Intouch Group, Inc., a cell phone software development Co.
Mr. Melcer received both his BA in Economics and his MiBA in Rhetoric from the University of California at Berkeley.
carlos.melcer@aureliusplc.com
Monu Jacob Joseph
Mr. Joseph has extensive transactional experience with venture capital, mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, and joint ventures. While Mr. Joseph historically worked with technology companies both as a banker and as a lawyer, he currently works with clients in a wide array of industries.
Mr. Joseph has over 10 years of transactional experience, which includes 5 years spent as a lawyer with Morrison & Foerster's corporate finance group, work with Hudson Venture Partners and its portfolio companies, as well as investment banking with CIBC World Markets Technology, Media and Telecom Group. He has represented or worked with real estate advisory firms, venture firms, private equity funds, hedge funds, investment banks, financial services companies and a host of multi-national corporations. He has extensive experience working with media, software, hardware, and internet companies.
Mr. Joseph received a bachelor's degree from the University of California Santa Barbara , received a law degree (magna cum laude) from the University of Iowa where he was a member of the Iowa Law Review, and has an MBA from Oxford University.
monu.joseph@aureliusplc.com
Michael Lopez
Michael has 30 years experience in the fields of media, communications and technology focusing on sales/marketing, distribution and corporate development. He began is career as a Technology banker with Bank of America in Silicon Valley finding and providing financing to start-ups and emerging technology companies. After several years, he moved to New York City and took an executive position with Columbia Records (now known as Sony Music). His responsibilities were the international marketing and distribution for such artists as Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Bob Dylan and Barbra Streisand. Promoted to the CBS Television, Mr. Lopez handled the day-to-day management of the CBS stations in the Southeast US.
He was recruited to join the leading independent video distributor Vestron to develop a more robust international division. Over three years, the division grew from $4.0 million in annual revenue and 10 employees to over $60 million and 175 employees. Highlights included Michael Jackson’s Thriller and the feature film, Dirty Dancing. Subsequent to Vestron, Mr. Lopez consulted with HBO to build their rights valuation models and plan for international video distribution. Upon execution of this project, he was hired as Vice President at Columbia Tristar Pictures (now known as Sony Pictures) to head feature film and television program distribution for international television (for Tri-Star), international video, and worldwide cable.
Mr. Lopez then returned to Silicon Valley to become the Director, Mobile Content for SanDisk, the world’s leading company in memory cards, USB drives and other memory devices. With SanDisk, he built relationships with content providers including motion picture studios, television production companies and music distributors. Among the various projects was the preloaded Rolling Stones mobile card. He worked closely for nearly three years with all major MNOs, handset manufacturers and other mobile ecosystem companies building digital content aligned with memory devices.
Mr. Lopez is currently consulting for Wikipedia, the world’s fifth largest website/portal. Mr. Lopez provides strategy and execution for business partnerships and monetization models.
He is currently President of the non-profit organization, Hispanic Net (www.hispanic-net.org) and works on Presidential Appointments with The White House. Mr. Lopez received his B.A. and M.B.A. from Stanford University
So it appears that Val is operating in the right circles and after reviewing the info on Aurelius you will understand why the need for Ark Venture Capital to be so vague.