Meet your new legal team

James founded Avantia in 2019, having previously been a Managing Director and GC of the asset manager Och-Ziff (now Sculptor Capital). At Och-Ziff, James covered trading and regulatory matters, as well as PE, real estate and a special sits lending business. James also sat on the firm’s Investment Committee. Prior to this, James was a corporate lawyer at Slaughter and May and holds a law degree from Oxford University.

Hannah joined Avantia in 2023 from Finastra where she was COO of the global Payments business delivering software to banks and FIs. Prior to that she spent 10 years at Vodafone in range of M&A, technology strategy and operations roles. Hannah spent the first half of her career as a financial services litigation lawyer at Macfarlanes and Osborne Clarke. Hannah lives in deepest Gloucestershire with her family and other animals.

A seasoned commercial leader, prior to joining Avantia Dan built an impressive career in Sales, and subsequently spent 10 years as a GTM consultant advising firms operating at the intersection of professional services and technology. Dan holds a BA Hons Accountancy and is a CIMA passed finalist. He lives in London, has three children and outside of work is a fan of sports and enjoys cooking and cycling.

Patrick co-founded a legal-AI startup with James in 2019 and has served as Chief AI Officer at Avantia Law since 2022. He is a full stack software engineer and an expert in machine learning, holding a PhD from the Intelligent Systems Lab at Oxford University. He is also a DeepMind scholar. In his free time, he enjoys writing about machine learning and AI, participating in sports, travelling and playing the guitar.

Stuart was previously a client of Avantia as Senior Transaction Counsel at a large US Credit Fund, working across various European investment themes and geographies. Prior to this, Stuart was part of Milbank’s Financial Restructuring Group, where he advised on high value, multi-jurisdictional restructurings. Exiled from his Northern roots, Stuart lives in Southwest London with his wife and children.

Lauren was Avantia's first legal hire in 2019. She started her legal career at Freshfields in 2004, qualifying into the Banking team and focusing on leveraged finance and restructuring deals. She is a certified executive coach and is passionate about lawyers' performance and mental well being. Lauren lives in Devon with her family and can mostly be found getting muddy outdoors with her two young children.

John has over 30 years’ experience in business; firstly as an engineer and latterly as a lawyer. Before joining Avantia spent 7 years in solo law practice, focusing on real estate licensing and permitting. John is on the Cambridge (Massachusetts) Tennis Club and Cambridge Skating Club board and is a committee chair for Cambridge Boat Club.

Patrick trained as a solicitor with Slaughter and May before moving as an Associate to Freshfields banking team in London. Upon completing his Advanced Masters in Philosophy and Democratic Theory, Patrick joined Avantia as Managing Director of Compliance and has built the team and the KYC business. In addition to being obsessed with cooking and cats, Patrick is the creator and host of a philosophy podcast.

Audrey joined Avantia in 2019, having graduated in Law from Kings College London. She headed Recruitment and HR for a time, and now serves as Chief of Staff to the CEO. In her spare time, Audrey is an avian enthusiast; she keeps pet birds, and her dissertation examined bird law in the United Kingdom.