Our Board

Sanjay Lobo (Chair)

Sanjay joins us following many years launching and running high growth digital businesses. His more recent experience includes several executive roles at Vistaprint, the Nasdaq-listed $5bn online print company. There, Sanjay ran Marketing for the European business, before running Vistaprint's global partnerships team. His responsibilities included launching multiple new business units, driving significant revenue growth. Earlier in his career, Sanjay was a solicitor working as the GC at Lastminute.com

Jo Cruse

Jo is acting MD of Edspace, our offices and the UK's hub for EdTech and innovation in education. Jo has extensive experience in education - both as a former teacher at Merchant Taylor's Schoo and as Exec Director of The Unreasonables, providing pupil leadership courses for young people. Prior to working in education, Jo held a number of key positions in South Africa’s main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance - including Chief of Staff to the Parliamentary Leader.

Dan Heard

Dan Heard is Business Deveopment Director at Ernst & Young, responsible for UK&I Government and Public Sector markets. Previously Dan served as Business Development Director at Capita Plc. He has a particular focus on public sector commercialisation and joint ventures; translational science; and education, employment and skills. Dan began his career in the UK Civil Service, after completing his PhD at King’s College, Cambridge. He worked in a variety of government departments, often focussing on employment and skills policy, and spent several years supporting Lord Browne of Madingley, both in Cabinet Office and on his Independent Review of Higher Education Fees and Funding. Dan is convinced of the transformative impact of education and skills development on individual lives; and of the social and economic benefit of widening and deepening opportunities for participation.

Erfan Soliman

Erfan is a biomedical engineer and entrepreneur, passionate about education and healthcare. He has a degree in Electrical Engineering from Harvard University and a DPhil in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Oxford. He is co-founder of a digital health company focussing on infant wellness, particularly exploring the link between feeding and neurodevelopment. Erfan also teaches engineering subjects at Oxford and conducts research on innovation theory.

In 2015, he founded Oxford Global, a social enterprise that organises educational programmes designed to introduce students to diverse viewpoints and global issues, while bridging gaps in education quality and access. With events in five countries around the world, OG aims to educate young leaders about international relations and enable them to further their discourse and insight into their specific fields of interest. The organisation now serves over 2000 participants attending its events on an annual basis, with over 40 countries and nationalities represented.

GARY HOLMES

Gary has 13 years of progressive experience in finance and analytics. He has held FD positions for both publicly listed and privately owned businesses across a broad range of industry sectors; most recently for a business providing regulatory risk solutions for financials services, including large banks and insurance firms. He's also an advisor to a number of start-ups and brings a strong commercial leaning to his approach to finance and analytics, with a wealth of experience in technology and digital marketing investments. Gary hails from a working class background and is a strong advocate for social mobility and granting talented, hard-working people equal opportunities to reach their goals.