Our Team
Leading with Experience and Insight
Our leadership team brings together many years of experience and expertise in agribusiness, North and Latin America, mergers and acquisitions, strategic growth, and operational excellence. Leveraging backgrounds in top global firms and deep regional knowledge, we ensure that our portfolio companies benefit from unparalleled guidance and access to a vast network of industry leaders and potential acquirers. The principals and its Advisory Board collectively have over 20 years of consulting, 5 years of Government experience, and more than 100 years of operating experience.
Philippe J.C. Gastone
Managing Partner, Co-Founder
Philippe Gastone has extensive experience in Corporate Strategy, Mergers & Acquisitions and Corporate Development. He has acquired a strong cross-continent and cross-border experience in Europe, USA, South and Central America. He has led corporate development initiatives, acquisitions and divestitures in multiple industries (including food) while working in large corporations, strategy consulting and Investment Banking. He was a co-founder and Principal of Booz Allen Acquisitions Services (BAAS). He advised and managed growth strategies and transactions for more than twenty years from strategic analysis through execution, negotiating and closing as well as on post-merger integration issues.
Mauricio Gonzalez-Sfeir
Partner, Co-Founder
Mauricio Gonzalez-Sfeir, based in Bolivia and the United States, is an executive leader with extensive experience and responsibilities in both the private and public sectors and in academia. This includes functional expertise in corporate strategy, the successful development of large investment projects, organizational management, sustainability, and Mergers and Acquisitions. He is a motivated team player with quality knowledge on the development and execution of ambitious business strategies, short term goals, and long-term objectives. He is an acknowledged disruptor of underperforming assets to increase growth, financial health, and productivity.
Alex G. Perico
Partner, Co-Founder
Alex Perico is a Brazilian-American, raised in New York City, where DNA evolved by working for the some of the most reputable firms in Wall St. In his more than 25 years of experience as an investment banker and strategic investment consultant, he advised clients in a wide range of industries with operations in the United States and Latin America extending to Asia and Europe.
At Citigroup for over 10 years, he was a Vice-President in the International Private Wealth Management unit managing $400 mil portfolio of clients with Fixed Income, Equities, Hedge Funds, Venture Capital and Private Equity holdings.
BOARD OF ADVISORS
Robert E. Yarhi
Co-Founder, Partner, and Senior Advisor
Robert Yarhi is a successful entrepreneur in the US packaging space, where he built a leading company in flexible packaging mainly for food manufacturers. He is also a shareholder and a Director of the SigmaQ Group. SigmaQ is the leader in the packaging space in Central America and Mexico, the group is diversified in Corrugated Packaging, Folding Cartons, Rigid Containers, Flexible Packaging and Luxury Boxes.
José Claudio Godoy
Senior Advisor
Mr. Godoy is a well-known entrepreneur in the agri-business segment in Brazil. A cattle rancher by trait and family tradition, Mr. Godoy has built a media conglomerate that consists of five TV channels, including “Canal do Boi”, a pioneering channel founded in 1995 that auctions live-televised genetically superior bull matrixes and high level cattle herds. Mr. Godoy and his family also founded various businesses that made them a reference in the world of agrifood in the country.
Luis (Lou) P. Nieto, Jr
Senior Advisor
Lou is president of Nieto Advisory LLC, an advisory firm that works with small and mid-cap consumer foods companies. He retired in 2009 as president of ConAgra’s $8.0B Consumer Foods business. He was previously President of ConAgra Meats in 2005 and President/CEO of the Federated Group, a private label business, from 2002 to 2005. He was a Group President and Corporate Officer of Dean Foods from 2000 to 2002. Earlier, he spent 2 years with Mission Foods and 10 years with Kraft Foods. Lou started his career with Quaker Oats in 1981.
Violy Mc Causland
Senior Advisor
Mrs. McCausland-Seve has been completing value-added transactions and providing advisory services for the past 40 years for her clients globally and particularly throughout Latin America, creating one of the most powerful networks in the industry. She is recognized as one of the most successful bankers on Wall Street. In Latin America and Spain, she has pioneered privatizations, financial restructurings, and the return of companies to the global capital markets.