Moderator: Tim Human, senior reporter, IR Magazine
Tim Human is senior reporter at IR Magazine. He rejoined the publication in 2019 after two years working as a freelance journalist for a range of international publications. Previously, Tim was editor of IR Magazine between 2013-2017. He has also written for Corporate Secretary, IR Magazine’s sister publication, and CorpComms, the UK-based magazine for corporate communications professionals.
Evan Barth, vice president, associate general counsel and assistant corporate secretary, Kyndryl
Biography coming soon.
Sylvie Harton, chief business strategy officer, Lumi Global
Sylvie Harton is currently the Chief Business Strategy Officer at LUMI Global where she leads LUMI’s future growth strategy. Prior to her role at LUMI Sylvie was SVP, Strategy & Global head of IR and PR solutions at Notified where she led M&A, strategic partnerships, and P&L for its global IR and PR solutions business.
She draws on 25 years of executive leadership and expertise in organic, inorganic expansion, and turnaround situations with global scope and credibility in IR solutions, PR solutions, ESG & sustainability. She brings a win-win approach to strategic partnership and alliances negotiation. Sylvie is a passionate advocate of bringing the client to the table when making strategic business decisions and a firm believer that strategy is the anchor for sustainable corporate performance that benefits the marketplace, workplace, and the global community. Prior to LUMI, Sylvie held various executive positions with Nasdaq and Marketwired, where she spent a decade growing the organization to its successful exit to Nasdaq. Sylvie is a recent graduate of The Wharton School and the University of New Haven EMBA program. She holds a Law and Finance degree from Université de Montréal and Concordia University in Canada.
Vanessa Rech, strategic IR & communications specialist, Keyter Rech Investor Solutions
Career
- Vanessa began her career with EY in the National Marketing Department and then formed a new strategic business unit focusing on development projects in Africa.
- She then joined SCMB’s Africa Consulting Services division, becoming involved in the privatisation of public sector assets funded by the World Bank and international multi and bilateral donor sponsors, working primarily across Africa.
- In 1999, she joined HSBC where she worked as an Investor Relations Manager to 2004, before starting Keyter Rech Investor Solutions.
Experience
- For the past two decades, Vanessa has been involved in strategic investor relations and communication for listed companies and has well-rounded experience in strategic investor relations and message positioning. Her investor relations skills were most recently recognised when she participated on a panel at the Investor Relations Society of South Africa Conference in October, as well as winning three awards for a client earlier in the year at the Intellidex, Top Investor Relations 2023 – Ranking South Africa’s Top Investor Relations Professionals.
- Well-versed in message development, highlighting, and talking through potential problem areas to ensure that communication is balanced, to the point, and strategic.
- Daily tasks include providing strategic advice to listed companies and dealing with the CEO, CFO, Company Secretary, and the Board of Directors.
- The other side of investor relations involves speaking to institutional shareholders, analysts, high-net-worth individuals, fund managers, retail investors and other stakeholders. She has built an excellent rapport with all these individuals based on knowledge, trust and reputation.
- Service offering and skills set includes: a yearly investor relations plan, construction of a contact database, market perception polls, shareholder analysis and targeting, interim and final results roadshows (which include attending the 1:1 meetings), AGM’s, capital market days (or site visits), annual report and sustainability (ESG) report writing and project management, writing of commentary and SENS announcements and writing, distribution, positioning press releases to ensure the best coverage.
- Understanding the stock exchange rules, governance and sustainability (ESG metrics), GAP analysis and report writing.
