CEO
ScaleUp Institute
Irene is the founding CEO and board director of the ScaleUp Institute. A former senior banker at Standard Chartered Bank where she held European and global managing director roles, she set up and scaled several of the bank's key client and product businesses across its corporate and institutional bank and led several global M&A activities.
Before joining the ScaleUp Institute, Irene was Managing Director at the UK's banking industry association heading up a range of strategic industry activity across the regulatory, business and international arena. This included leading the industry in the establishment of the Business Growth Fund (BGF) and Open Banking.
Irene sits on various advisory boards and is a visiting professor at Strathclyde University. She was awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2019 for services to business and the economy.