Ajay Kavan Joins KKR as a Senior Advisor in Europe
21.6.2021 10:00:00 EEST | Business Wire | Press release
KKR, a leading global investment firm, today announces the appointment of Ajay Kavan as a Senior Advisor in Europe, effective immediately. Based in London, Mr. Kavan will support KKR’s pan-European investment activities in technology and digitally-enabled businesses and will advise KKR’s portfolio companies. In particular, he will focus on the consumer internet sector in eCommerce and direct-to-consumer offers, as well as companies undergoing major digital transformation programmes.
Ajay most recently served as CEO of Matches Fashion, where he supported the business through the impact of the pandemic, strengthened the leadership team and improved customer experience, technology and operational performance. Prior to joining Matches he spent nine years in senior roles at Amazon including VP International Special Projects, VP Amazon Fresh International and VP UK Consumables. He was responsible for launching Amazon Fresh across Europe and Asia, developing strategic partnerships with retailers (including Morrisons in the UK), developing its international physical stores, led Amazon’s subscription businesses across the EU and scaled Amazon businesses across multiple categories. Ajay has over 20 years of online experience and prior to Amazon, he led the launch of the online channels and multi-channel capabilities for three different retail businesses. Previous roles included Marketing and Strategy and Multi-channel Director roles within Home Retail Group plc and Kingfisher plc. Ajay is also the Vice Chair of In Kind Direct, a UK charity that distributes consumer goods to charitable organisations globally.
KKR’s Senior Advisors bring leadership skills, knowledge-sharing and deep industry expertise. They help drive value creation by providing advice and best practice to KKR’s investment teams and the executives, entrepreneurs and management teams of its portfolio companies. Mr. Kavan’s appointment follows that of TMT Senior Advisors Diego Piacentini in 2019, and Adam Warby in 2020.
Tim Franks, Partner and Head of EMEA Consumer & Retail at KKR, Jean-Pierre Saad, Partner and Head of EMEA Technology at KKR, and Philipp Schaelli, Principal in EMEA Private Equity at KKR, said: “Ajay will be a fantastic resource for our executives and our portfolio company management teams, bringing decades of experience in digital transformation, e-commerce and direct-to-consumer product development. He joins at an exciting time for KKR’s technology investment platform in Europe, with digitalisation a critical part of every business’ strategy and operational agenda.”
Ajay Kavan said: “KKR builds strong relationships with founders and management teams and has a track record of supporting them to deliver exceptional value creation. KKR is deeply committed to continuing to build its technology platform and I’m really excited to work with the KKR team and with leaders in their portfolio companies.”
KKR has invested over $25bn in tech companies in the past ten years across over 140 investments. Since the start of 2020, KKR has made over 20 tech investments globally, investing over $5bn in equity. Major recent EMEA technology investments include Cegid, Exact, Devoteam and Zwift.
--ends--
About KKR
KKR is a leading global investment firm that offers alternative asset management and capital markets and insurance solutions. KKR aims to generate attractive investment returns by following a patient and disciplined investment approach, employing world-class people and supporting growth in its portfolio companies and communities. KKR sponsors investment funds that invest in private equity, credit and real assets and has strategic partners that manage hedge funds. KKR’s insurance subsidiaries offer retirement, life and reinsurance products under the management of The Global Atlantic Financial Group. References to KKR’s investments may include the activities of its sponsored funds and insurance subsidiaries. For additional information about KKR & Co. Inc. (NYSE: KKR), please visit KKR’s website at www.kkr.com and on Twitter @KKR_Co.
To view this piece of content from cts.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210621005048/en/
Contact information
Media Contact: International
Alastair Elwen / Sophia Johnston
Finsbury Glover Hering
Telephone: +44 20 7251 3801
Email: kkr@fgh.com
About Business Wire
For more than 50 years, Business Wire has been the global leader in press release distribution and regulatory disclosure.
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
Coherent Solutions Launches AKTIV, a Dedicated Fitness and Wellness Technology Business Unit10.11.2026 17:34:00 EET | Press release
Coherent Solutions officially launches AKTIV, a dedicated business unit focused exclusively on fitness and wellness technology. AKTIV brings together over 15 years of fitness industry experience, dedicated leadership, and global engineering capabilities to help fitness and wellness operators and equipment manufacturers compete through technology. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261110242555/en/ Coherent Solutions officially launches AKTIV “We know the fitness and wellness industry and the challenges operators and manufacturers face. With AKTIV, we spend less time defining what needs to be built and more time delivering solutions that improve operations, member experiences, and business performance,” said Vadim Bartlov, Managing Director of AKTIV. AKTIV builds on Coherent Solutions' established work with leading fitness companies, including Life Time, Planet Fitness, Anytime Fitness, Orangetheory, and BowFlex,
Mouser Explores the Newest Computing Technologies Beyond Moore's Law in its Technology Series10.11.2026 17:12:00 EET | Press release
Mouser Electronics, Inc., the authorized global distributor with the newest electronic components and industrial automation products, today announced the latest installment of its Empowering Innovation Together (EIT) technology series, Moving Beyond Moore's Law. The series explores how engineers are advancing computing performance as traditional semiconductor scaling approaches its physical limits, from chiplets and advanced packaging to silicon photonics and emerging transistor technologies. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261006980414/en/ Explore what comes after Moore's Law as the industry seeks new paths to computing performance. As a key driver of semiconductor advancement, Moore's Law has served as a roadmap for the industry, describing the trend of transistor counts on integrated circuits doubling approximately every two years. With conventional silicon transistors becoming increasingly difficult to shr
Netceed appoints Eric Updyke as Group CEO10.11.2026 16:15:00 EET | Press release
Netceed, a global leader in delivering supply chain solutions across broadband, data center and energy infrastructure, today announced the appointment of Eric Updyke as Group CEO, effective 10th November, 2026. He succeeds Alper Türken, who will step down as CEO on 10th November, 2026. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261110492065/en/ Netceed appoints Eric Updyke as Group CEO Eric brings more than 35 years of leadership experience in communications and technology infrastructure. Most recently, he served as CEO of Spirent Communications plc from 2019 to 2025. At Spirent, he led the company's shift from a hardware-centric vendor to a solutions provider built on software, automation and services. He also expanded the business into new sectors, including AI data center providers, and guided it through a strategic sale, culminating in its $1.5 billion acquisition by Keysight Technologies in 2025. Before Spirent, Eri
80% of IT Leaders Say the Digital Workplace Is Critical to AI Success, Yet Only 10% Have Fundamentally Redesigned It, Lenovo Research Finds10.11.2026 16:00:00 EET | Press release
Eight in ten IT decision makers say the digital workplace is critical to successful AI-led transformation, yet only 10% report fundamentally redesigning it for AI, according to Lenovo’s sixth Work Reborn report, The AI-ready workplace. The findings expose a significant gap between deploying AI tools and the operating capabilities needed to integrate them into how work gets done across an organization. The report frames workplace readiness as a connected system spanning people, workflows, technology, support and governance, with each contributing to how enterprises translate AI ambition into business outcomes at scale. Based on an August 2026 survey of 1,200 IT leaders at organizations with at least 1,000 employees across 12 countries, the report examines the workplace conditions needed to translate AI deployment into measurable value. While 76% rank AI-led transformation among their organization’s top IT priorities, only 27% have scaled AI across business functions. AI Deployment Is No
Nearly Nine in 10 Private Capital GPs Face Data Validation Challenges10.11.2026 16:00:00 EET | Press release
Nearly nine in 10 (88%) of private capital general partners (GPs) surveyed say their finance and operations teams spend between 11% and 50% of their time validating, reconciling, recalculating or recreating administrator outputs, according to new research from CSC, the leading provider of global business administration and compliance solutions¹. CSC surveyed more than 300 GPs and 200 limited partners (LPs) across North America, Europe, the U.K., and Asia Pacific. The report, Future Private Capital CFO 2026, examines how fund finance, liquidity management, reporting, outsourcing, cybersecurity, and AI governance are reshaping the role of the private capital CFO. Half of GPs say their finance and operations teams spend 11% to 25% of their time validating, reconciling, recalculating, or recreating administrator outputs, while 38% put the figure at 26% to 50%. As firms add asset classes, structures, jurisdictions, liquidity tools, and reporting requirements, complexity is increasingly bein
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom