Michael Anderson

Michael Anderson is a high profile business investor with extensive experience at raising finance and managing several small companies.

Born in 1958, the first class Cambridge law graduate worked in a commodities trading company for five years after university, setting up one of the first trading seats when the London International Financial Futures Exchange opened.

In 1985, following the sale of his family's chocolate business, Michael invested in a small printing business and ran it for nine years. He took the company into a specialised niche in non-security plastic cards and later sold the company to an Irish conglomerate. He then stayed on the Board of the acquirer for a further three years.

Whilst running the printing company, Michael started to build a portfolio of private company investments as a business angel which included Cobra Beer.

In 1997/98, Michael spent one year on the Sloan International Management Programme at London Business School, specialising in entrepreneurial activity. After graduating from LBS, Michael started consulting to SMEs, focussing on the fields of business planning and accessing finance, while continuing with his plans for business angel investing.

In 1999, he was invited to become Chief Executive of an e-learning software company. He raised angel, VCT, venture capital and corporate venturing investment for them over four years before discovering that there was little market appetite for corporate e-learning.

Michael now has a number of roles, all with SMEs. He is a mentor for NESTA, a Director of Business Plan Services Ltd and a non-executive director of three companies, as well as giving regular talks on business plan writing and angel investment.