Charles Breed: Managing Director SaaS Practice - Americas

Charles Breed is a seasoned M&A expert with over two decades of experience at Cisco, Symantec, SAP and KKR. He has closed over 75 international transactions worth $28B in complex mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures. Known for his strategic insight and meticulous diligence, Charles has been instrumental in facilitating successful deals across a diverse range of industries such as SaaS, Cybersecurity, Identity Access Management, E-commerce, and FinTech.

Charles has spent his career as a VP of Corporate Development, responsible for Buy-Side M&A, IP in-bound licensing, Corporate Venture Investing, Divestitures, and International Joint Ventures. His technical area of expertise has been Cybersecurity, Identity Access Management, BOT Management, AI/ML, Subscription Billing, Enterprise Performance Management, eCommerce, Social Media & Creative Content Generation and Marketplaces.

Charles has been in the Software-as-a-Service industry since it first began, working on PKI, secure e-mail, VPN, and network security in general. Charles has the unique blend of business savvy and technical background. He has spent the majority of his career in San Francisco Bay Area, working at Cisco Systems on CiscoSecure and various M&A transactions. Charles has been continually active in various IETF working groups, such as IPsec, PKIX and the chairperson of the Open PGP working group. Charles has also gained worldwide recognition for speaking on PGP, S/MIME, VPNs, and PKIs at major security events.

The Information Security Magazine featured his PKI article as the cover story. Charles is also the author and creator of the industry’s de facto “Cryptographic Reference Chart” and “Security Threats Reference Chart”, and “Network Security Reference Chart” with over 350,000 in print, translated into three languages and sold at the NSA Cryptologic museum in Fort Meade, Maryland. Mr. Breed is on the board of Directors for five prominent Companies. Charles holds a degree in Business Administration and Management Information Systems from the University of San Francisco, a master’s degree from Up, Certificate programs from Stanford and taught at UC Berkeley a graduate course on M&A. He is a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) from ISC2.

Charles has a diverse background that is seldom found in just one person. He attended Law School, he has FP&A financial modeling skills, has developed security & payment processing protocols in use today, conducts deep due diligence across all attributes of an organization, such as Corporate Structure, Finance, Legal, Contract, Quality of Revenue, Operations, Sales Operations, Tax, Facilities, Human Resources, Market Communications, Product Marketing, Compliance, Regulatory and more. With Charles running your process, nothing is overlooked so you can ensure a smooth process that delivers the highest value to your shareholders

Tyler Block: Managing Director - Americas

Tyler is part of the US operations and leads Software and Services sectors for the US market. He brings nearly 20 years of M&A investment banking and top-level corporate strategy consulting experience to the team.

Tyler previously led deal teams for Redwood Capital, a New York-based middle market M&A firm and Gemini Partners, a Los Angeles-based middle market M&A firm. He has successfully completed numerous sell-side M&A transactions and has been a winner of The M&A Advisor’s Consumer Services Deal of the Year Award. Prior to LockeBridge, Tyler was a management strategy consultant at Accenture. Mr. Tyler is a graduate of Harvard, having successfully completed his undergraduate studies in Economics and his graduate studies in Finance.

Jim-Hageman

Jim Hageman: Director - Americas

Jim Hageman currently represents Sett & Lucas as a Director of Investment Banking primarily working with Strategic Buyers and Private Equity Groups.

Jim has over 20 years of experience in M&A, Corporate Development, and Information Technology working with companies in North America. Prior to joining Sett & Lucas, Jim worked with Generational Equity, as a Sr. Business Advisor, providing M&A capabilities to small to mid-market companies. In addition, Jim worked with a number of Information Technology companies, including CompuCom, Cap Gemini, Decision One, and Enter in the areas of Corporate Development and Technology offerings.

Muthukumar Velumani (MK): Managing Partner - APAC

Muthukumar (MK) manages investment banking operations and supports transaction advisory services with a focus on the Asia Pacific markets.

He is based in the India office of Sett & Lucas in Chennai. With over two decades of senior operating experience with global financial institutions, MK is a private placement, M&A, book building and due diligence expert.

One of the major highlights of his career was the successful merger and integration of the Royal Bank of Scotland and ABN Amro. At the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), MK was transition and integration manager and instrumental in the successful transition of global investment banking processes in the target operating model, post-acquisition of ABN Amro.

He has worked across treasury, mortgage and interest rate derivatives, driving change in ABN Amro and was also instrumental in creating a platform to migrate the more complex investment banking operations in ABN Amro by successfully leading the pilot for the complex Marco Polo project.

MK holds a post graduate diploma in finance, is a chartered financial analyst, and holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering.

Dominic Marlow: Managing Partner – UK

Dominic Marlow manages the investment banking practice for the EMEA region based out of London.

Dominic is a veteran deal maker in the mid-market, with vast experience across numerous sectors, having completed over 50 successful transactions over the past five years. He is a renowned executive coach who works with several privately held and private equity held company CEOs in London.

He combines board level and executive experience with corporate finance, to help CEOs achieve shareholder value maximization. Dominic has also achieved a high level of success working with IT services and enterprise software companies in the Thames Valley region, facilitating strategic joint ventures and long term exit planning by putting the principal at the heart of the relevant activity. Living in Oxford, he is located at the heart of the UK technology community, close to regional innovation parks, the Thames Valley and London, and has mentored several early and growth stage companies over the last decade.

Dominic has been a professional dealmaker since 2005, prior to that he held several senior strategic and corporate development roles working for GKN, Britvic and executive consulting roles with Nestle and Coca Cola. This previous corporate background, coupled with more recent involvement in the middle market, gives him a remarkable insight into both large acquirers and middle market sellers.

He has been very active in the information technology vertical and continues to lead the M&A practice of Sett & Lucas with a focus on companies in UK and the rest of the European Union.

James Battison: VP - Investment Banking - UK

James Battison works directly with UK and European clients to help unlock value through strategic Mergers & Acquisitions.

James represents Sett & Lucas as VP of Investment Banking across the UK and Europe. Having spent the previous 5 years within the Sett & Lucas Group, James stepped into this roll as VP of S&L’s investment banking practice in 2022.

James is a subject matter expert in tech enabled services and have previously worked as Chief Commercial Officer for a UK-based RPA and Intelligent Automation company. He was pivotal in scaling the business from a bootstrapped start-up to a successful tech services organisation serving mid-market customers in both the UK and US.

James works closely with CEO’s right from their first engagement with Sett & Lucas. His ability to rapidly gage the wants and needs of the CEO whilst also deeply understanding the business and it’s assets enable James to truly support them in unlocking value through M&A activities.

Wilfried Pototschnig: Managing Partner - EMEA

Wilfried Pototschnig is a Managing Partner at Sett & Lucas responsible for the further development of the firm’s European operations with a particular focus on the DACH Region ( i.e. Germany, Austria and Switzerland).

He is a seasoned deal maker with a proven track record in the field of M&A and corporate finance with over 25 years of experience in originating, leading, negotiating and closing cross-border transactions in EU, Eastern Europe and Russia.

Prior to joining Sett & Lucas he was Head of M&A at a sizeable Austrian financial institution and has overseen the strategic direction and execution of all major group-wide M&A activities in the EU and (South) Eastern Europe. Furthermore, he held several (executive or supervisory) board roles in a number of group companies throughout the region.

From 2001 – 2011 Wilfried Pototschnig played a pivotal role in the M&A advisory space serving as the Head of M&A at PriceWaterhouse Coopers (Moscow, Russia) and KPMG Corporate Finance Russia & CIS. He advised clients on complex transactions across various industries and led deal teams of dynamic professionals.

Wilfried holds both a Master’s degree and a Ph.D in business administration from the Vienna University of Economics and Business, Austria.

Emanuel Ross: Director - Investment Banking - Americas

Emanuel Ross joined Sett & Lucas in 2024. As a Director, he is responsible for origination and execution of transactions in technology services covering Canada. He has more than 10 years experience working with publicly traded corporations, private equity groups and private and family-owned companies navigating divestitures, acquisitions and mergers.

Emanuel’s experience includes leading and executing sell-side and buy-side transactions across Canada and the US in business services, packaging and technology, media and entertainment.

Emanuel has developed deep industry expertise and transaction execution skills to help support entrepreneurs and enable them to achieve their goals and drive results.

Before joining Sett & Lucas, Emanuel was Vice President at RBC Mid-Market M&A. Previously, he was a Director at BDO M&A and Capital Markets. Prior to that, Emanuel supported the corporate development of Cirque du Soleil and Cogeco Media.

Emanuel started his career at EY and holds a bachelor’s degree in finance from HEC Montréal. He holds the CPA (IL) and ABV designations.

Prabhu Antony: Board Member / Executive Director

Prabhu Antony is an Board Member / Executive Director at Sett & Lucas, managing the investment banking business with a focus on M&A and capital raise in the information technology and digital marketing industry verticals.

Prabhu Antony is an Board Member / Executive Director at Sett & Lucas, with two decades of corporate finance experience, focused in Software, IT Services, Digital marketing and Industrial- IOT sectors. He has consummated capital raise, Mergers & Acquisition and debt syndication deals valued over $3.5B in enterprise value across 6 continents and 22 countries.

He is also the President, Co-Founder and CFO of StoneBridge (Nasdaq: APAC), a public listed $200M SPAC focused in Asia & Emerging markets. He is also on the board of Linus ventures – A secondary markets focused fund, Scieniti – An early stage venture fund and S&L Growth fund – A SaaS and Technology focused hedge fund.

As an investment banker, he has won several awards from M&A Advisor, the leading global industry consortium for Mergers and Acquisition. In 2016 he was awarded Investment Banker of the Year among 650 participating financial institutions in the US, in 2015 he was ranked among the top five cross border investment bankers in the US, in 2017 his deal Starpoint acquisition by Day & Zimmerman won the best M&A deal of the year and in 2014 he was awarded the 40 under 40 Americas M&A Dealmaker award.

At Linus Ventures, he has had three notable investments and eventual exits, these include a secondary investment into Docusign exited through an IPO, a late stage investment into Meetup exited through acquisition by Wework and an early stage investment in the food delivery market exited through an acquisition by an Asian Unicorn. Through Linus and Scieniti, he currently sits on the boards of several firms based out of US, UK, Central America and India across industries such as Manufacturing, Consumer Products, Human resources, Sports Marketing and Healthcare, collectively employing over 1200 people.

Prior to joining Sett & Lucas, he was vice president at MAPE Group, a boutique M&A advisory firm in Asia, where he was the head of the technology, media and telecom (TMT) vertical and the US-Asia cross border M&A practice. Prior to MAPE, Prabhu spent his first seven years in the technology sector for blue chip companies such as Cognizant, i-flex and Oracle, where he managed corporate development, corporate strategy, corporate restructuring and M&A initiatives across London, the US and Asia.

He holds a bachelor’s degree in electronics and instrumentation engineering, a masters in business administration and a post graduate diploma in international business.

Prabhu is an alumni of Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Anna University. His business specialties and interests include disruptive innovation, Cross border M&A and Board observer roles.