The Founders : The Team
Duncan Sperry
Co-Founder
Duncan Sperry has operated in over forty countries worldwide with seven years’ military service and thirty years’ in international business in financial technology (fintech), data security and trusted third party services.
Educated at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and Durham University, Duncan was commissioned into the Royal Engineers, serving operationally in the UK and overseas.
Leaving the army as a Captain, he joined security printer, De La Rue, working with government departments in the Middle East and Gulf States.
After a period as Marketing Manager with NM Schroders, a global custody provider in asset management , he was recruited by Verifone, the Silicon Valley global leader in fintech, to set up their greenfield distributor markets in Nordic, Middle East and Africa, followed by Regional Management in South East and South Asia out of Singapore, and General Manager, UK Region.
More recently, he has specialised in secure systems for governance and decentralised finance, utilising Distributed Ledger Technology for verification and risk management in high-value asset transactions.
He has a strong interest in the geopolitical and technological drivers for innovation, disruption and emerging trends and is a published author of geo-political thriller Fault Line. An active climber, he was until 2024 Chair of Mount Everest Foundation and is currently President of the Alpine Club, the world’s first mountaineering club.
Duncan holds an Executive MBA (Distinction) from Durham University, specializing in Corporate Finance and Corporate Governance.
Dr David Best
Co-Founder
David has held Board level positions in private and public sector organisations for over 40 years and is a highly regarded C Level Executive.
He advises a number of
private sector clients including Wales’s largest independent accounting practice, Encyclis where he chairs the Local Laison Committee of the Newhurst Energy Recovery Facility, and The Royal Meteorological Society.
From 2020-2021 he was COO of Difrent Ltd prior to its sale to TPX Impact, and from 2018-2020 was on the Executive of UCAS as Director of Analysis and Insight.
David was a Senior Civil Servant as Director at the UK Office for National Statistics (2015-2018) and was Interim Head of Transformation for the Ministry of Justice from 2013-2015. He joined the UK Government Digital Service from 2012-2013, as Senior Adviser working with the Government CTO and the Head of the GDS.
From 2011-2012 he was Transformation Programme Director for Old Mutual plc, and was Adviser to the Board of the £6bn Base Metals Business of Anglo American from 2002-2011 and chaired their International CTO (Chief Technology Officers) Council from 16 countries for over ten years.
From 2000 -2004 he was start up CEO of a successful dot com business which was taken over by Deloitte.
David spent 14 years as Senior Partner in Deloitte Consulting, where his roles included responsibility for the IT practice in London and the European Energy Practice.
David has advised UK, Brazilian, Australian, New Zealand, and Canadian government departments on the commercial application of Technology, Digital and Data, and numerous international businesses on strategy, programme management, and the introduction of technology.
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He has held a range of academic and advisory roles in Universities in the UK, and in Chile, and was also a Trustee of the Guild of the Hospital of St Bartholomew and interim Treasurer from 2012-2015.
From 1982-1992 he was the founding Chair of Sinfonia Viva, the Classic FM Orchestra for the East Midlands, and is a Trustee of the Elgar School of Music,Worcester. More recently he has founded the Beauchamp Chamber Orchestra.
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David Spencer
Co-Founder
David has over 20 years of experience in infrastructure, planning and environment communications in a range of sectors, including large-scale developers such as Vattenfall, Green Investment Group, Biffa and Hitachi.
In 2018, he founded Sterling Communications to support infrastructure developers and investors with their most challenging projects, planning communications, stakeholder management activities.
Today he works with some of the largest infrastructure developments in the UK, the USA and globally, from initial inception, through complex planning processes and into their construction and operational phases.
David has a reputation built on a strong track-record of business development, careful management of project/media communications and delivery of multiple new energy infrastructure schemes