Praetura Ventures, the Manchester-headquartered VC investor, has appointed three new industry heavyweights as operational partners to mentor its growing portfolio of 37 companies.
Siobhan Almond, Mark Horncastle and Penny Attridge have all joined Praetura’s operational partner programme, which connects a team of experienced business leaders and former C-suite executives with the VC firm’s portfolio of tech and life sciences businesses to support their strategy and growth.
Siobhan is a senior law professional who spent over ten years at leading fashion retailer JD Sports (JD), including almost eight years as the FTSE 100 company’s general counsel and company secretary.
During her tenure, Siobhan helped steer JD to success across 32 countries while overseeing many of the firm’s pivotal mergers, acquisitions and minority investments in smaller brands, leading JD towards profits of close to £1 billion.
A pharmacist by training, Mark Horncastle was previously a partner and the UK head of healthcare at the multi-sector management consultancy PA Consulting, where he spent 12 years driving innovation and transformation within the health sector. He specialises in system design, digital transformation and utilising data to enable patient and service outcomes.
As well as leading on PA’s global health & life sciences strategy, Mark led the business’ Manchester office and was heavily involved in Greater Manchester’s healthcare transformation through its devolution plans, including the design of urgent and emergency services, integration of health and social care, and the scaling of primary care services.
