Entrepreneur · Merchant banker · Chairman
A pioneer in entrepreneurship and merchant banking.
Four decades of strategic leadership, venture creation and international corporate finance.
Profile
Meet Harald Torbjörn Gabriel Jakob Kinde, a distinguished Swedish entrepreneur and merchant banker. As co-founder and Executive Chairman of Amber Fusion Limited, Jakob has played an integral role in the establishment and growth of several UK-based companies.
His merchant-banking experience includes senior positions at Kleinwort Benson, having begun his career at Samuel Montagu & Co Ltd, now HSBC Investment Banking, as well as founding Libertas Capital.
Jakob also served as Chairman and Trustee of Noble Tree Foundation Limited. The organisation has since closed.
Early life & education
Born on 30 October 1958 in Gothenburg, Sweden, Jakob is the youngest son of celebrated artists Kurt Kinde and Ninni Enell. His formative years were spent in Sweden, Portugal and England before he settled in England during his late teens.
Between 1964 and 1979, his education included Askim Skolor in Sweden, St Julian’s School in Carcavelos, Portugal, Restenäs Boarding School in Sweden, and Edward Greene’s Tutorial Establishment in Oxford. Jakob has four adult children: Christian, Geraldine, Alexandra and Daniel.
B.Sc.(Econ) in philosophy and economics, University College London, 1979–1982; accountancy at the Certified Accountants Educational Trust, 1982–83; and Financial Accounting at London Business School in 1982.
Business career
From corporate finance to retail, property, technology and renewable energy, Jakob’s career spans institution-building and cross-border transactions.
1982—1985
Corporate finance · London and Stockholm
Jakob began his career at Samuel Montagu & Co Ltd, now HSBC Investment Banking, working in corporate finance in London and Stockholm. In 1985, he was part of Carnegie Montagu AB, the joint venture between Samuel Montagu & Co. Limited and Carnegie Fondkommission AB.
View reference1983—1987
Founder and Managing Director
Founded as a shirt retail business, Fil à Fil grew to 12 London stores and franchise stores in Dublin, Glasgow and Brighton. The business was sold profitably to Next plc in 1987.
1987—1999
Managing Director · Nordic Corporate Finance
Jakob held several senior positions, including Head of Nordic Corporate Finance and Head of the Forestry and Paper Sector. His work covered equity issues, IPOs, mergers and acquisitions across financial services, engineering and technology, renewable energy, forestry and paper.
View reference1988—1995
Founder and Managing Director
Jakob founded and led this property investment and rental firm. The company was restructured and sold profitably in 1995.
1999—2002
Co-founder, director and CEO
Jakob became a director, shareholder and co-founder of NewMedia Investors Ltd and NewMedia Spark plc, later Spark Ventures plc. He co-founded and served as CEO of EO plc, an online share-distribution platform for technology companies’ equity fundraisings, and also co-founded AllIPO plc.
2002—2011
Founder, Executive Chairman and Senior Partner
Founded in November 2002, Libertas Capital focused on technology, clean technology and renewable energy. The investment bank had regulated subsidiaries in London, Los Angeles, New York, Stockholm, Dubai and Hong Kong.
2012—present
Chairman
Jakob has served as Chairman of Boustead Agriculture Limited since July 2012 and Chairman of Boustead & Co Limited since December 2013. Boustead is a third-generation company founded by Edward Boustead in Singapore in 1828.
View referenceAcross an extensive career, Jakob has completed
over $80bnin diverse corporate finance transactions.
Philanthropy & non-profit work
Aside from his business ventures, Jakob was actively involved in philanthropy. He established the Noble Tree Foundation in 2016, originally founded in 2003 under a different name and purpose. The charity owned over 400 properties and provided housing to more than 1,000 vulnerable individuals in the UK.
Jakob is also co-founder and editor of Det Gamla Göteborg, launched in 2014. It has become one of Sweden’s most active history platforms, attracting between 20,000 and 30,000 unique visitors each month.
On the record
In light of misleading and damaging articles found online and elsewhere, Jakob wishes to clarify the inaccuracies and identify the evidence which disputes those statements.
As Executive Chairman of Libertas Capital Group plc, Jakob was affected by the HBOS fraud scandal in 2009 during the credit crunch. The company went into administration despite receiving new funding offers to continue its successful operations. On 5 December 2018, Jakob received a formal apology letter from the then CEO of Lloyds Bank plc, which had taken over HBOS during the credit crunch.
Jakob was exonerated from a complex, multi-jurisdictional film-financing fraud case with the assistance of the Metropolitan Police Fraud Office. Supporting documents include a letter from the Metropolitan Police Fraud Office. The case went to the Court of Appeal in 2015 and set a legal precedent for the validity of digital signatures under English law.
The cited Boustead Beef article refers to a Zimbabwean company and not the similarly named UK company. The UK company has been dormant since its formation in 2016, was established for a client if needed, and Jakob is no longer a director. Jakob’s position is that the article is incorrect and appears to have been published without adequate fact-checking.
Read the referenced articleA 2022 Swedish article was inaccurately translated into English. The European solar-energy developer mentioned was a client of Jakob’s. Its 2022/2023 UK Companies House filings showed more than €20 million in its latest filing, and the company stated that it was planning a US IPO. The article concerns Boustead Renewables’ role in a fundraise and a private placement of existing shares for professional investors; it does not describe dealings in fictitious shares. The company and its owner’s dispute with Realtid has since been settled and was unrelated to Boustead Renewables’ work as consultant.
Read the referenced articleContact
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