Appital, the Equity Capital Marketplace, has made two strategic appointments to its management team. Brian Guckian will join as Chief Business Development Officer and Philipp Eberle as Head of Strategy; both will support Appital’s mission to bring technological innovation and automation to equity capital markets. Appital aims to ‘unlock and uncover’ liquidity for investors, enabling buy-side firms to execute large volumes, often in excess of five days of Average Day Volume (ADV), with minimal market impact or risk of price erosion.
Guckian is an experienced Head of Equities with over 25 years experience working in the financial services industry. He was formerly Head of Sales and Trading for SEB before moving into capital introduction, VC deal origination and execution. In his new role as Chief Business Development Officer, Guckian will introduce Appital’s capabilities to buy-side clients, advisory firms, and eventually corporate entities, allowing them to gain greater exposure to deal flow and execution opportunities.
Eberle has worked extensively across the full life cycle of the equity offering process, from origination and syndication to advisory at financial institutions in London. Prior to joining Appital, Eberle was Vice President at Barclays’ ECM team, covering clients in the DACH and Norcic regions; and worked with Nomura, SEB and STJ Advisors. Central to his new role will be working alongside Appital’s CEO and CTO to deliver on the current growth and platform development plans as well as to drive the product development and ‘route to market’ strategy for future platform functionality.
Mark Badyra, CEO of Appital, says: “I am thrilled to welcome Brian and Philip to the Appital management team. Their industry insights and equity capital markets expertise are invaluable as we scale up our business and implement our vision: to bring technological innovation, automation and transparency to equity capital markets and unlock liquidity for investors.”
The Appital platform will allow buy-side firms to gain greater exposure to deal flow opportunities they have not been able to access before, helping portfolio managers and heads of trading build a comprehensive picture of liquidity, including highly illiquid, small and mid-cap stocks. The Appital book-building and allocation methodology is highly efficient, unbiased and unconflicted, delivering a fair outcome for all market participants, in line with best execution requirements.
Brian Guckian, CBDO of Appital, says: “I am delighted to join Appital at such an exciting time for the business. There is a clear need in the equity capital market space to access deal flow opportunities and I look forward to working with the Appital team to make our capabilities available to the wider buy-side community.”
Philipp Eberle, Head of Strategy for Appital, adds: “Having first hand experience in running an ECM team at Barclays, I am excited to join Appital and fully support their goal to make the equity capital market more transparent and efficient for investors and participants alike. Technology and automation have radically changed almost every aspect of the trading lifecycle, yet ECM desks have remained largely untouched. It is time for this to change.”
