Fausto Zanetton

Founder & CEO

Fausto Zanetton is the Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Tifosy, which he founded after seeing an unprecedented need for professional advisory services and financing solutions in sports. Fausto directs the firm’s strategy and is responsible for managing the business as well as being actively involved advising clients on large M&A and financing transactions.

Fausto is one of the most sought-after and trusted advisors in the sports industry with over 20 years’ experience advising global media, sports, entertainment and technology companies. He is the former Head of Sports and Entertainment at Morgan Stanley having previously held positions at Goldman Sachs (TMT London) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (Brussels and Boston). Select former clients include Vodafone, RTL Group, Perform Group (DAZN), Walt Disney, Discovery, Mediaset, F1 Group, AS Roma, Spotify, Endemol and various large TMT-focused private equity firms.

Fausto holds an MBA from London Business School, is a qualified chartered accountant (US CPA) and is fluent in several European languages.

Gianluca Vialli

Co-founder

Gianluca is the co-founder of Tifosy and serves as a non-executive on the Board. His experience in professional sports encompasses a stellar international playing career, as well as extremely successful careers in first-team management and sports analysis. Gianluca is actively involved in advising the firm’s clients on sports and business strategy.

Alongside his responsibilities at Tifosy, Gianluca represents Italy as Head of the National Team Football Delegation and is the co-founder of Fondazione Vialli e Mauro which funds research into Cancer & Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS).

As a professional player, Gianluca played 488 times at senior level for clubs including Cremonese, Sampdoria, Juventus and Chelsea. He was the winner of 10 major domestic trophies and four European cups including the Champions League as captain of Juventus. He represented Italy 59 times, scoring 16 goals, and was inducted into the Italian Football Hall of Fame in 2015. After retiring as a player, Gianluca managed Chelsea football club, winning five trophies, and also Watford FC before becoming a Sky Sports commentator, football analyst and media personality in respect of Serie A, the Premier League and European competitions.

Tommy Aylmer

Managing Director / Chief Legal Officer

Tommy is a Managing Director and the Chief Legal Officer at Tifosy. Tommy joined the firm in 2017 and is actively involved advising clients on M&A and financing transactions, legal documentation and sports regulation. Tommy also oversees the wider team and the firm’s investment platform activities as a regulated entity.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Tommy was a senior corporate lawyer at leading European law firm Arthur Cox specialising in M&A and corporate finance. He has a wide range of experience including advising on public and private M&A, high-yield bond issuances, private equity, IPOs, finance structures and corporate governance. Select former experience includes advising Goldman Sachs on Activision Blizzard’s $4bn takeover of King Digital, Shire Pharma’s on its $12.1bn high-yield bond issuance and Greencore Group plc on the US$747.5 million acquisition of Peacock Foods.

Tommy holds a bachelor’s degree in business and law from University College Dublin and professional solicitor qualifications from the Law Societies of Ireland and England & Wales.

Marco Re

Managing Director

Marco Re is a Managing Director at Tifosy and head of the Italian office. Marco joined Tifosy in 2020 and as well as having responsibility for the Italian market, also leads the firm’s strategic client coverage as an adviser to top tier clubs and clients across Europe. Marco has an in-depth knowledge of the sports industry and is valued by clients for his holistic view on the sports financing market.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Marco served as Chief Financial Officer and Secretary of the Board at Juventus FC where he held responsibility for all financial and non-sporting operations. During his twenty years at Juventus, Marco led various capital market transactions including leading the club through its IPO, €300m rights issue, stadium construction financing, J Village financing (real estate fund structure) and €175m high yield bond issuance. As an experienced CFO, Marco has a detailed understanding of not only industry specific financing arrangements, such as factoring of broadcasting and player receivables, but also related developments having assumed senior leadership roles in the J Medical and J Hotel projects.

Marco holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Turin and has been enrolled in the Italian Register of Chartered Accountants and in Register of Auditors since 2003.

Tim Williams

Managing Director

Tim Williams is a Managing Director at Tifosy and runs the UK business. Joining in March 2021, Tim is responsible for the strategy and development of the business in the UK, focusing on strategic and capital solutions to a wide range of clubs across multiple leagues. Tim is a finance professional with more than 25 years' experience including 15 years in sport, media, advertising and entertainment.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Tim served as Chief Financial Officer and member of the San Siro stadium management company board at Inter Milan, where he held responsibility for financial, strategic and management reporting and the Group's financing and capital structure since 2015. While at Inter, Tim led the issue of structured bond and RCF facilities totalling €425m as well as securing short-term lending on numerous occasions. Tim also has extensive experience of the UEFA Financial Fair Play regulations after leading Inter Milan to the successful conclusion of a four-year FFP Settlement Agreement.

Before joining Inter Milan, he trained with KPMG and held senior finance roles for advertising agency McCann Erickson and Manchester United FC. Tim holds a bachelor's degree in finance from Manchester Metropolitan University and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales.

Maxime Budin

Executive Director

Maxime Budin is an Executive Director at Tifosy and a core member of our client coverage team. Maxime is actively involved in the execution of M&A and financing transactions.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Maxime was an Investment Banking Associate at Goldman Sachs where he acted as advisor to financial institutions (FIG), building extensive experience working on various M&A transactions, IPOs and debt financings. He also worked at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Deutsche Bank.

Maxime holds a master’s degree in Management from ESCP Europe / Cass Business School and is fluent in French, English and Spanish.

Simone Bonfiglio

Executive Director

Simone Bonfiglio is an Executive Director at Tifosy and a core member of the client coverage team. Simone is actively involved in the execution of M&A and financing transactions.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Simone was an Investment Banking Associate at Credit Suisse, where he advised in the media, sports and telecom sectors on financing solutions, growth strategies and capital structure optimisation. He also worked as a Sales Associate on the Financial Analytics team at Bloomberg.

Simone holds a master’s degree in Finance from Esade and in International Management from the London School of Economics and Political Science. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Bocconi and is fluent in Italian, English and Spanish.

Nicola Verdun

Head of Business Development

Nicola Verdun is the Head of Business Development at Tifosy. Nicola is responsible for the firm’s business development strategy and various senior relationships within the sports industry across Europe.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Nicola was Head of Global Partnerships and International Development at Juventus FC where his responsibilities included developing the club’s brand and commercial footprint on a global basis as well as securing sponsorship contracts with major international brands. He also worked at Nielsen Sport (formerly Repucom) where, as European Business Development Director, he provided full-service sponsorship, marketing analysis and evaluation to rights holders and brands seeking to maximise their assets and return on investment within sports and entertainment.

Previously Nicola was Account Director at MEC Access, a sports marketing agency specialising in research, negotiation, strategy, activation and evaluation for international clients such as Procter & Gamble, Nestle, Pirelli, Xerox, Visa and Sony Ericsson.

Nicola holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Turin.

James Pollock

Chief Marketing Officer

James Pollock is the Chief Marketing Officer of Tifosy. James is responsible for developing the firm’s overall brand, marketing, content and digital strategy, as well as leading the marketing and distribution strategy for transactions on the Tifosy Investment Platform.

Prior to joining Tifosy, James spent 14 years leading business, commercial and marketing strategy on multinational brand portfolios. He worked across a wide range of consumer goods categories as strategy consultant to Nestle, Heineken, Arla, Coca Cola and Starbucks across EMEA markets before most recently joining Unilever as Global Strategy Director for the company’s €10Bn Refreshment portfolio, defining strategic focus areas and leading of key initiatives to drive profitability and return on assets and owning the category M&A funnel.

James began his career at Procter & Gamble, where he spent four years in local markets driving strategic and brand initiatives before moving to Geneva to assume leadership of the $500m Western European household cleaners business, with responsibility for business, portfolio and brand/marketing strategy, sales & operations planning and P&L for four brands across seven market units.

James holds a master’s degree from the University of Cambridge.

Mrinal Sinh Smith

Chief Product Officer

Mrinal Sinh Smith is Chief Product Officer at Tifosy. Mrinal has overall responsibility for the product strategy and development of the Tifosy Investment Platform as well as leading platform innovation, operations and overseeing certain tech-enabled regulatory functions.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Mrinal was Head of International Publishing at the Guardian News & Media. As part of the senior management team that led the Guardian to becoming the most-read newspaper in the world, he held responsibility for consumer revenue products including core news business representing 65% of revenue as well as launching the Guardian's apps and digital subscription products. Mrinal also worked at global advertising agencies Saatchi & Saatchi and McCann, leading digital, data and membership strategies for brands including Visa, Costa Coffee and Philips.

Mrinal holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Geoff Tidey

Chief Technology Officer

Geoff Tidey is the Chief Technology Officer at Tifosy. Geoff leads the team responsible for the technical development and maintenance of the Tifosy Investment Platform and integrated company website.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Geoff had over 20 years of professional development experience in multiple programming languages, development processes & environments. He worked at SiS (Satellite Information Services), Kelkoo and Lovefresh building bespoke and complex systems for real-time gambling & live television, online retail & fintech.

Geoff holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of De Montfort.

Daryl Watson

Lead Developer

Daryl Watson is a Lead Developer at Tifosy. Daryl is responsible for the development and implementation of new platform features as well as overall site upgrades and maintenance.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Daryl began his career in the luxury hospitality industry before retraining as a coder at the prestigious Makers Academy in London where he went on to coach other students. Daryl is now a full-stack developer with experience using Ruby on Rails, Javascript with Backbone and ES6, and PostgreSQL.

Sara Pedrotti

Legal & Compliance Officer

Sara is a Legal & Compliance Officer at Tifosy. Sara joined the firm in 2021 and oversees and manages legal and compliance matters for Tifosy in Italy as well as assisting with legal and transactional matters in the Tifosy group as a whole.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Sara was an associate at DLA Piper advising primarily on leveraged and acquisition finance, project finance, distressed lending and debt restructuring transactions. Sara has a broad experience in finance and debt capital markets and before joining DLA Piper trained with Latham and Watkins in Milan and worked as an associate in the banking and finance department. During her career Sara has also completed banking secondments at Intesa Sanpaolo and UniCredit and advised on specialist transactions in the sports sector including the financing of the AS Roma stadium and the structuring of the €300 million senior secured bonds issued by Inter Milan.

Sara holds a master’s degree in law from the University of Trento and a professional qualification from the Italian Bar Association.

Alex Kossmann

Finance Director

Alexander Kossmann is Finance Director at Tifosy. Alex is responsible for the firm’s finance, corporate affairs and investor relations. He also oversees data analytics for the Tifosy Investment Platform.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Alex was a Client Associate at Julius Baer and before that at Merrill Lynch, trading and delivering portfolio analysis and research in the equity, fixed income and currency markets. He also worked as a financial analyst at Tenaris, a large multinational in the oil drilling industry.

Alex holds a master’s degree in finance from the London Business School and a bachelor’s degree in banking and finance from the London School of Economics and Political Science. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Montevideo and is fluent in Spanish, German and English.

Charlie Compitus

Senior Marketing Manager

Charles Compitus is a Senior Marketing Manager at Tifosy. Charlie is responsible for marketing strategy and execution with a focus on digital community development and content creation.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Charlie was Media Officer at Millwall Football Club, responsible for producing graphic and video content. He is an experienced creative developer with skills in video production and design, photography and graphic design and animation.

Charlie holds a bachelor’s degree in contemporary media practice from the University of Westminster.

Tom Murray

Marketing Manager

Thomas Murray is a Marketing Manager at Tifosy. Thomas is responsible for marketing strategy and execution with a focus on digital community development and content creation.

Prior to joining Tifosy, Thomas worked as a Graphic Designer on various premium lifestyle brands including London food retailer Sourced Market, luxury homeware brand British Colour Standard and contemporary artist Lauren Baker. He has advanced expertise in 2D and 3D design practices across traditional and digital media, and experience of a wide range of design applications, CAD software and video production techniques.

Thomas holds a bachelor’s degree in design from Central Saint Martin’s University of the Arts, London.